Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald’s speech during Dáil debate on the Planning for Constitutional Change Bill 2026. Ms McDonald’s Dáil contribution in full:
Tonight, the Dáil can take a major step towards Irish Unity in our time.
Tonight, we can begin the final length of our national journey from peace to reunification.
The Bill Sinn Féin brings before the Dáil this evening is historic.
If passed, it would be the first-ever legislation directing the government to start planning and preparing for a United Ireland.
The Bill compels the Taoiseach to produce and publish a government Green Paper and set out its vision for reunification.
It will also establish a first-ever All-Ireland Citizens’ Assembly on Irish Unity to consider these proposals.
It would put the work of uniting Ireland at the very heart of government and the Oireachtas.
The story of our nation is a story of challenge, adversity and struggle.
But more importantly it is a story of perseverance, hope and overcoming incredible odds.
A story of enduring belief that a better future for Ireland is possible.
That spirit is best reflected in the achievement of the historic Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
Twenty-eight years ago, leaders from all communities came together and made peace. The agreement brought conflict in Ireland to an end. To this day, it stands as an historic, international success story in peace-building.
It created space to acknowledge the hurt, pain and loss on all sides. To build a bridge of understanding, a pathway for healing and a process for real reconciliation.
The Good Friday Agreement was about institutional arrangements and human rights standards.
However, at the very core of the agreement is the provision of the right of all the people, north and south, to determine Ireland’s future at the ballot box by way of referendums.
And we now need to do the work necessary to plan and prepare for the people to vote on a United Ireland.
We are nearly thirty years on from the Good Friday Agreement.
There has been nothing rushed, hasty or pre-emptive about this process. Over the last three decades, we had big challenges, disagreements, political confrontations, we have had high and lows – of that there is no doubt.
However, the peace is secure. It is robust, resilient and commands wide support.
It is now time to write the next chapter. The chapter of reunification.
We in Sinn Féin believe in partnership and collaboration. Michelle O’Neill leads the Executive with determination to make politics work for everyone. But above all else, we believe that we must build Ireland’s future together.
Reunification is of course about removing the border, but not only that. It’s about so much more.
It’s about seizing the moment and the opportunity to create a new deal for the people of Ireland – for every person on this island.
A New Deal for Protestants and Unionists which protect their British identity, replacing the bad treatment and abandonment from Westminster with real ownership, inclusion and respect as citizens. To have a real stake in the future.
A New Deal to break with the failures of the past and build a New Republic that works for everyone, where prosperity and secure life is open to every citizen.
This New Deal of reunification is about building a better life for workers and families right across Ireland.
It’s about harnessing the resources of the entire nation to build a better future but also to meet the big challenges of today.
To ensure that every citizen, every family has a place to call home.
It’s the best way, the only way to deliver an all-Ireland public universal health service.
Through Unity, we can build the best education and childcare systems for every child and young person. We can strengthen public services, tackle poverty, and build a fair society in which disabled people and those who care are supported to live full lives as equal citizens.
Reunification provides us with the opportunity to use the engine of the all-island economy to create jobs, drive investment, and secure a successful and dynamic economic future with world class infrastructure.
Irish Unity also represents a New Deal for our young people.
Too many generations have lived their lives in a partitioned Ireland. It has held back young people. It has curtailed potential and ambitions
It has denied them their right to live in a unified nation with access to all the possibilities that this offers.
We say enough of that.
We owe it to our young people to recognise unity as the historic opportunity of this time, and to seize it with both hands.
Now is the time to build a hopeful future for all the young people of Ireland regardless of background, tradition, religion or identity.
This is what reunification offers but we must start the planning and the preparation now.
That is what this Bill seeks to stimulate and advance.
Any government truly focused on a better future would positively and enthusiastically draft and publish a Green Paper on a United Ireland.
A positive vision covering all topics including public finances, taxation, public services, human rights, governance arrangements and relations between Britain and Ireland.
The establishment of a Citizens’ Assembly will be groundbreaking.
It would bring together representatives from the people of Ireland, from all communities, because all citizens have a stake in the future.
Allowing debate on competing ideas and different perspectives on unity, encouraging debate on the shape of the future constitutional arrangements, and facilitating discussion on the financial, social, economic, and political challenges and solutions.
It will be a forum for real discussion on what our new, United Ireland would look like.
The Taoiseach’s position – often stated – is that reconciliation must happen before reunification. I respectfully say that perspective downplays three decades of genuine reconciliation initiatives and real progress on the ground and in communities.
It fails to recognise that discussing and planning our future together is reconciliation.
Reunification is itself a reconciliation process. You cannot separate one from the other, no more than tell the dancer from the dance.
The question is often asked – can we afford unity?
My answer to that is simple – we can no longer afford partition. We can no longer afford the dislocation of North from South.
We cannot miss the opportunity that unity presents in terms of economic scale, development and progress but also when it comes to the organisation of our public services.
The scale of change we are witnessing demands that we prepare for constitutional change and reunification.
Britain’s Union is now under unprecedented pressure.
We now have pro-independence First Ministers in the North of Ireland, in Scotland and in Wales.
All who seek a future beyond Westminster and the post-Brexit chaos that has dominated British politics, or more accurately English politics for a decade.
All who want a future where the people of our nations choose our destinies.
That is our common cause.
For us in Ireland, that means working toward and securing a date for referendums on Irish Unity.
The government should not stand against this tide of change.
It should embrace it.
It should lead it.
Good government is about recognising threats and weaknesses but more importantly about identifying opportunities and grasping them.
We need to recognise that a United Ireland is the greatest opportunity of our generation. It is the big idea for our future.
The question is not if there will be unity referendums, but when those referendums will be held.
And the bigger question is whether we will be prepared for an informed, inclusive process of transition.
I want a process that is peaceful and orderly.
And this demands that preparations start now.
And is what our legislation is about.
Is í Aontacht na hÉireann an deis is mó atá ag ár nglúin. Is í an fhís mhór d’thodhchaí ár dtíre. Is ré nua í d’oibrithe agus do theaghlaigh ar fud na hÉireann.
Ní mór dúinn an deis a thapú go huile is go hiomlán. Ní mór dúinn pleanáil agus ullmhú do reifrinn aontachta.
Anois an t-am. Taispeánaimis misneach, fís agus díonghabháilteacht chun deireadh a chur leis an deigilt agus phoblacht nua a thógáil do chách.
Partition failed the people of Ireland.
We have our responsibility to plan and prepare for a United Ireland.
To lay the foundations of the nation we wish to pass onto our children and they to theirs.
So, let’s not miss this moment.
Let us work to ensure that the government of Ireland and the Oireachtas becomes the lead driver of reunification in our time.
Let us now walk this length of the journey with confidence,
hope and real purpose.
That is what this legislation is about.
And it is with unwavering belief in Ireland and all of our people, that I this legislation to the Dáil.
