We have long had emigration in Ireland. But the nature of emigration has changed. With ferries to Britain and the continent, as well as air travel, emigration isn't the cut­off it used to be. In addition, some of our young people are being educated to levels beyond our present capacity to provide the jobs they are qualified to do. So they go abroad. Many want to come back, especially when they have children they would want to be raised in the Irish society and in the Irish educational system.

I'm coming to a sense of a women's movement which was extraordinarily important in the struggle for freedom in Ireland and immediately afterwards, but then some of those women who were involved in the movement got involved in representative positions and perhaps some of them got a bit distanced from the grassroots issues. But also the women's movement itself seemed to say, "No, we've got our own government, our own parties in power" and they sat back.

If you live in a global world and you want to champion liberty in it, then you have you got to sign up to that global world.

I want to see a UN that enables a gathering of energies in which business plays its proper role.

One of the richest countries in the world - the United States of America - is facing a real ethical dilemma in terms of providing equitable access to health care.

There's a worldwide linking of environmental activists, developmental experts and human rights advocates. And they're using the two frameworks, in particular environmental standards and human rights.

The fossil-fuel-based development model has not benefitted all people and those who have benefitted least are now suffering great harm in the face of climate change.