Mr. Roland Freudenstein:

I will begin with Deputy Eric Byrne's questions. On the matter of the roll-call vote and the practices of the European Parliament, two factors have been at play which do not apply to that extent in national parliaments. One is that national differences in the European Parliament overlap and sometimes run contrary to political families, so to speak. This happens also in member states in the case of regions but certainly not as strongly as in the European Parliament where it is not only political allegiance to one political family that counts but sometimes also very much nationality. This tends to influence the decisions and weaken the hold of political groups over their members. In the European Parliament there is usually a grand coalition in place to deal with many of the questions that are considered painful, that is, all of the really important questions on labour law, the working time directive, consumer protection, the use of chemicals and the services guidelines. There is a fear that a voting result of 51%-49% in the European Parliament will make the losing side turn anti-European. This fear has increased with the rise of populists in European politics. It is probably an unhealthy, vicious circle. The rise of populists reinforces the grand coalition mentality in Brussels which, in turn, reinforces the rhetoric of the populists that the Brussels elite is remote from citizens, that the members of this elite are all in cahoots. The view is that they agree on all the decisive questions and that there are no real political alternatives. That cycle has to be broken by making an effort to highlight the political alternatives. One of the means of doing this would be by having stronger factional discipline in the European Parliament which in our view would be promoted by the roll-call vote system.

On the role of the United Kingdom, the development in the past few months has been staggering. No one on the Continent or here expected such a quick erosion of a constructive attitude to the European Union. I am not referring solely to the Conservative Party but also to the media and public opinion. I am even talking about the lobby group of entrepreneurs and the big business community which we continentals considered to be our lobby in Great Britain. For a couple of years there was a group called Business for a New Europe which was pro-European and europhile. That group still exists and is advocating its policies, but suddenly the group called Business for Britain has appeared which is much more vocal and radical in the sense of being anti-European. This group has become more prominent than the group Business for a New Europe. This is an example of how things have accelerated in a direction which we really cannot comprehend.

As to where this will end up, the answer is that we will either have a marginal status for Great Britain within the framework of the European Union or else a so-called brexit. Germany is one of the countries that absolutely does not want the latter to happen. The two countries have common ground on a range of policy issues. In recent months, to take just one example, the British Prime Minister, Mr. Cameron, and the German Chancellor, Ms Merkel, have more or less closed ranks on the question of the future of the European budget. Another aspect is that nobody on the Continent imagines that a Common Foreign and Security Policy which did not include Great Britain would be taken seriously anywhere in the world. It is impossible to say what the consequences of a decision by the British people to exit the European Union would be, but attempts will certainly be made both in Britain and among its partners in the Union to patch up the situation somehow and find a modus vivendi. Mr. Cameron has spoken about repatriating substantial powers from the European institutions to the British Government, but that will not happen. It would be bad enough to see Britain leaving the European Union, but it would be even worse to see the Union falling apart in a situation in which different countries were seeking to renegotiate their statuses. In that situation we would have not just two tiers but also a fringe comprising countries that did not want to join the core in the long term, all with different statuses.

The link between national parliaments and the European Parliament and its respective political groups is an issue that must be addressed. I cannot deliver a perfect solution in this regard and can only say that the sway held by, for example, the leadership of the German Christian Democratic Union Party and its national caucus over their people in the European Parliament is not absolute, at least during the first four years of a five-year parliamentary term. The last year is critical, of course, because that is when the discussion on the candidate lists for the next election begins, a matter that is in the control of national party chairmen. As long as that remains the case we will see, in the last phase of a parliamentary term, increased power for national party leaderships over their people in the Parliament. That is why the European Parliament party groupings - not just the European People's Party but others too - are advocating to change the system to give the power of nomination to themselves and not the national party leaderships. The reality, however, is that the latter will retain that power for as long as they wish. It should be noted too that there are a couple of disadvantages in transferring that right to the European parties. Generally speaking, there is a huge difference in perspective as between people in Brussels and their respective national parties, especially in the case of Germany. The Berlin perspective on the euro crisis, for instance, and therefore on the institutional future of the European Union, differs substantially from that of Brussels, in that it is much less federalist.

I cannot answer the point regarding votes for diasporas. I assume that the considerable size of the Irish diaspora is a factor in the differences the Deputy described.

Deputy Paschal Donohoe spoke about a greater role for national parliaments. I agree it is important for the purposes of legitimacy, but the question is how to achieve it. In the context of what is now in place by way of the Lisbon treaty, it is very difficult to say. There is a view in certain quarters that the second chamber of the proposed bicameral system should be comprised not of representatives of member states or of the Council but rather of delegates from national parliaments. The idea would be to pool the most active and dynamic members of national parliaments, those with a real interest in European affairs, and have perhaps four sessions per year in Brussels or Strasbourg. Those representatives would make up a type of senate.