Mr. Eddie Punch:

What are we hearing in Europe? I think it is fair to say we are coming up against very negative messaging from Europe. There is a bigger question and that is who runs Europe. The European Union used to have three institutions, namely, the Commission, Council and Parliament. In recent years, it seems to us that all control has moved to the Commission. The Commission was meant to be a neutral arbiter and overseer of the implementation of policy that should be led to a certain extent by the Council and EU Summits. The views of the Parliament should be respected properly and that is not happening in the European Union at the moment. I grant that is a big statement to make but the facts are these. In the last few years, the European Union has said it does not want money spent on the promotion of meat and dairy products. We have had an EU protein strategy which was meant to be about the provision of protein for feed but became an initial proposal to move to plant-based diets for citizens. We have had and an industrial emissions directive which was impossible for livestock farms to comply with. Granted, this directive has been rolled back. Yesterday, we had the vote on the nature restoration law. The history of that was that the Vice-President of the European Commission laid down the law to political parties in the European Parliament. The real question is to what extent the Commission is overstepping its mandate with respect to the way in which the European Union is meant to function.

If we go back to the nitrates scenario, we have to look at this very carefully. It is true that we have room to improve but as Deputy Fitzmaurice and others have said, the glass is actually half full. Half our waters are good quality. We are not the worst in Europe but at the top end when it comes to water quality, and that is not being recognised. If we allow the Commission to dominate the discussion, we are not going to win. There is a real political question about how this is being done. When Commissioner Timmermans told the European People’s Party that it had to do what he wanted - that is a fact and I have it on record - he suggested that if the EPP did not back down on the nature restoration law, it would find it difficult to get its policy agenda up to the top of the list. That was a huge overstepping of the role of the Commission. It seems to me that it was a threat to the democratic functioning of the European Union. I know that is a big statement but it is what happened. The 27 Heads of State have to bring back control.

To discuss a different issue, President von der Leyen took it upon herself to decide European policy on Israel and Gaza without proper consultation with the leaders of the 27 member states. That is a bigger issue that is outside our remit but it demonstrates that the Commission needs to consider where it stands and the Council, the EU Summits and the European Parliament have to regain respect in this decision-making process.