Ms Phil Prendergast:

I regret that I cannot be here on Monday as I will be in Brussels. I agree with the points made by Deputy Donohoe and Deputy Durkan on the politicisation of the Commission.

I wish to clarify for my colleague, Deputy Byrne, that we sign into all of our committee meetings and group meetings and at plenary there are roll-call votes for everything so there is a different interpretation of what that means. At any time a Member can ask for a check and get a roll-call vote taken on any piece of legislation. The roll-call vote record is a crude tool on which to measure one’s attendance because it does not equate with one’s actual presence. It is a little confusing how things work.

One of the areas of frustration in terms of people who criticise Europe is the fact that the majority of Parliament has voted consistently to have a single seat in Brussels but because of the treaty in France there must be 12 sittings a year in Strasbourg. The difficulty is that the cost is significant, including financially, for transporting all that goes with the travelling circus to go to Strasbourg each month and sometimes it is every couple of weeks, as it is currently. Does Mr. Freudenstein have a view on that?

With future accessions and proposals for further enlargement the difficulty is that we will suffer the loss of an MEP. If Turkey joins we will probably be further reduced because there is a cap on the number of MEPs that can be in Parliament and we will have a very much reduced representation in Europe as well. That makes people nervous because on one hand it depends on the spin but it is very populist to talk about a travelling circus if one is an opponent of what Europe and being European means. People have commented on the fact that we have had a couple of referenda because we did not like the first response of the people. People felt very much put-upon because the belief is that we did not understand the first time because we were stupid. However, it was not stupidity, it was a means of communicating a position that could be interpreted and bringing in all sorts of unrelated issues into the debate, including abortion. The former Chairman of the committee well knows the situation.