Ruairí Quinn
Question:20 Mr. Quinn asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs the date of the last meeting of the British Irish Council; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4022/01]
Written Answers. - British-Irish Council.
The first summit meeting of the British-Irish Council, BIC, took place in London in December 1999. Since then there have been a number of meetings at official and ministerial level. The most recent meeting of the British-Irish Council took place on 19 December 2000 in Belfast.
This meeting, which was chaired by First Minister Trimble and Deputy First Minister Mallon, looked at transport issues, the area of work for which the Northern Ireland Executive has taken the lead within the BIC. Ireland was represented at the meeting by the Minister for Public Enterprise, Deputy O'Rourke, and the Minister for Environment and Local Government, Deputy Dempsey. The members of the council held a wide-ranging discussion covering various aspects of transport and identified a range of key issues which will inform their future work.
As the Deputy will be aware, a summit meeting of the British-Irish Council was scheduled to take place in Dublin on 23 January last, but was postponed to facilitate the continuing discussions between the two Governments and the pro-Agreement parties. We look forward to hosting the meeting, which will focus on the issue of misuse of drugs, at the earliest possible date.