Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Mr. O'Ceallaigh and thank him for participating and his oral and written contributions to today's proceedings. There are several matters of which I strongly believe Ireland should be conscious. One of them has already been mentioned by Mr. O'Ceallaigh in his evidence to the committee. When I was a Minister and, before that, the Attorney General, I had occasion, particularly as Minister, to attend meetings of the Justice and Home Affairs Council and, at one stage, to preside over that session. There is no doubt that what Mr. O'Ceallaigh has described as the army of people the British had examining proposals for European legislative measures was hugely beneficial to Ireland. They were looking at things from a common law point of view and from our kind of philosophical perspective on politics, law and, on occasion, economics, in a way that the analysts of many other member states were not. Without being unfair to the Department of Foreign Affairs, which has limited resources, it was a significant assistance to that Department to know there were people in London, even including the European Union Committee of the House of Lords, examining these issues and looking around a few corners prospectively to examine what the implications might be for the United Kingdom. Those were often the same implications that would eventuate for Ireland if particular legislative projects were to be progressed. On one occasion, I, as Minister, was brought to the House of Lords to testify before its committee on European matters. I remember thinking it was like attending a viva vocedefence of a doctoral thesis at Oxford or Cambridge. It was a wholly intimidating thing for an Irish Minister to do and something that does not often happen in Leinster House.

The answer on this issue is that we will have to up our game very substantially and the public service will have to realise it will have to bring in non-public servant contributions, including academics or other experts, on proposed legislation. One just cannot have a kind of bilateral relationship between an Irish Department of state and the European Commission and have things dealt with at a kind of ambassadorial level at the EU. Other member states use their domestic resources in a very active way.

I am going to make a slightly controversial point with which Mr. O'Ceallaigh may not agree. At least he can bat it down if he disagrees with it. One of our problems in the context of European matters is that we tend to use Jean Monnet professors as participants in public discussion. They are well versed in European law and have an interest in it and their terms of reference are kind of communautaire.

We tend to rely on the European movement for commentary, analysis and criticism. We do not have sufficient devil's advocate analysis of proposals coming from Brussels that would suggest that if something is done, there is a need to have regard to the potential consequences. What I am saying is that we are going to have a vacuum in terms of analysis and expertise, and a smaller concentration of persons with experience on an issue. We can rely on the Irish Farmers Association, IFA, to kick up a fuss if something is coming down the road in the agricultural sector but we cannot rely on many other bodies in civil society to become a part of the process unless they are invited to do so by the permanent government. That is my tuppence worth. I again thank Mr. O'Ceallaigh for participating.