Colm Brophy (Dublin South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The simultaneous joy and problem of being Chair is that by the time you get to make a contribution a lot of ground has been covered. I want to focus or express a view on certain areas and get the witnesses' thoughts on them.

We talked a lot about the Franco-German position and axis. I call a spade a spade in that regard because it all hangs off the following. The question of enlargement and the Franco-German position, and that of treaty change, are all totally integrated. What people do not say openly is that the EU, the EEC, the European Coal and Steel Community, and the Common Market comprised a club of a small collection of like-minded states put together in a particular way to serve a particular purpose. Somebody alluded to how Moldova would move much faster than Ukraine and, of course, it is much easier to deal with a situation that is not monetary at all, but the expansion and taking on board of Ukraine rocks the boat completely as regards the geopolitical balance within the EU. That is what no-one really wants to talk about.

The Franco-German position paper is totally unacceptable. It is absolutely and unequivocally unacceptable. I agree in large part with people who said it is not so much a German position paper as a restatement of President Macron's ideas that he likes to float about every two years, particularly his absurd Saturn's concentric rings idea that we will put the new and smaller member states floating around out there where they can do little or no damage. It boils down to the preservation of power as it currently exists within the Union. The Union has to face up to this. That is the real problem. If we are going to absorb the new countries into the EU, and we should for security reasons and European collective progress, we will have to face some way of doing that. We will have to face the reality that we cannot gerrymander the treaty changes so that power rests in the west and we are basically pumping money into the east of Europe. We will have to collectively share. If we are to do that, we need to put an incredible strengthening on the rule of law side of things. We have seen what a state the size of Hungary can do when it de factogoes rogue. If we were to look at a situation of an enlarged Europe in future, and a state the size of Ukraine was to go rogue at some point after we tried to rebuild and restructure it, it would create such difficulty for the Union.

We are at a real change point. Ordinary people across the EU do not engage on treaty change or issues. What happens when a situation arises where they are asked to vote on something that has a direct impact on their country's situation within the Union, or the reality of where their country will be financially within the Union, they do engage. One of the grave worries I have at this moment in time is that if we were to go to referendums, the risk is that existing Europe would say "No", far more so than Ireland. Ireland is a very interesting case. I stand to be corrected on this but, by and large, when we hold a referendum and are then accused of holding a second one to achieve a different result, usually the same number of people vote "No" in both referendums but a majority of extra people turn out to vote, which changes the overall complexity of a "Yes" to a "No".

Europe, by and large, does not use the referendum process. Enlargement will become one of the most controversial issues because of how it will affect the existing balance. We are at real risk, when referendums are held, of having a "No" situation. There is a need for creative thinking. Some of what is happening at the moment is looking to try to find various solutions, some of which have been referred to by our guests. There were some positive ideas from the Parliament. There has been the usual collection of ideas when it comes to the European Parliament in respect of trying to increase its own power, but there have also been some positive ones about how to develop structures that allow things to happen without unanimous voting. I would express caution, however - and this was a point made by Professor Barrett - if we try to move away from unanimous voting. On the foreign policy side, if we had majority voting and a majority of the European Union voted in a particular way on Israel and Hamas, there is no way Germany would accept the situation. What happens when a member state the size of Germany decides to walk out on the agreed EU position? On one level, it is easy to say we should move to majority voting as the solution. On another level, as flawed as it is, unanimity at least brings the heft of having Europe as close as possible to speaking with a single voice. For all the faults there are to that single voice, it might be better than a situation whereby we put in place structures which cause a collapse.

What I have taken from the discussion with our guests, and it is a point that members have picked up on, is that we need at some point to consider how we alter treaties to enable enlargement. We need to ensure that the process is not self-serving. If we do it, Europe will fail eventually. All we will do is to delay that failure. We must be clear that any system must be based on the concept of the original European Union, which is bringing us together as a single Europe, and not the proposals that are originating in some quarters and which seek to divide and conquer with the concentric ring idea. That would lead to the eventual destruction of the European Union as we know it today.