Dara Murphy (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Dr. Ivory. I wish to return to Deputy Byrne's core point. Our limited resources in the permanent representation to the European Union were mentioned, but they are not that limited as a significant number of people work there. I would like to hear more about the relationship between how much energy goes into developing markets for Irish business, in other words the trade element, and how much energy goes on duplicating work done by the other 27 members of the European Union in sifting through data and information. I would also like the concept of democratic legitimacy, which is the big buzzword in Europe, to be teased out. How many decisions are made in buildings such as the offices of the permanent representation in Brussels, where subjective calls are made which are removed from the political process and do not find their way to committees such as this? Is there sufficient public scrutiny of decisions made on Ireland's behalf in Brussels in the offices of the permanent representation? We met both ambassadors recently and they are doing an excellent job. I wonder how it might be improved.

In this day and age do we really need an embassy in every EU capital? We certainly need a trade presence, but do we need an embassy given that we have EU passports? To develop this point, in the current economic climate would we be far better off having a presence in many joint European Union embassies throughout the world rather than picking and choosing those we perceive to be most important for a full Irish Embassy or consulate presence with nothing in other areas? The Lisbon treaty significantly allows for this.

The United Kingdom seems to be backing away. At the beginning of the week we attended an interparliamentary conference in Brussels at which there was no UK presence. Should we examine other bilateral arrangements? Obviously there is the euro. There are also north-south bilaterals, and Benelux was mentioned as were the Nordic countries. Which bilaterals should we focus on improving as well as those at which we are already quite good?