Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

To briefly return to the other issue, it always matters how EU regulations are applied in different member states and how people handle them. It is a regular occurrence that EU regulations are administered slightly differently in different jurisdictions; they are curtailed in some ways and extended in other ways. We have always had an open position and we transpose EU directives far quicker than most member states and implement them to the letter of the law — from my long experience, we do so far better than most.

In this issue, all I am saying is it matters how others administer schemes, particularly such a generous scheme. In social welfare and other areas, when a country improves its position, there are payments, whether they are pensions or welfare systems, that operate under reciprocal arrangements in member state countries and we honour them. We did so in this case as well. When we improve our lot and there is a reciprocal arrangement under EU regulations, we pay up.

On enlargement and the EuroMed summit, as we come to the end of a long round of enlargement that has been taking place since 1990, and the changes of 1988 and 1989 with eastern Europe coming in, now is a good time to look at where we go in future enlargements. The decision has been made on Turkey and how to implement it, and everyone accepts it will be a long drawn out issue. Even the Turks will accept we are talking about a decade.

The decision on Croatia has also been made. More recently, the decision was made to move to the next stage with regard to Macedonia. The Thessaloniki Summit during the last Greek European Presidency a few years ago indicated that we will have to deal with the whole region, including Bosnia Herzegovina and half a dozen other countries, on some basis when they meet the criteria.

More recently, my interpretation of the new neighbourhood agenda, which started under the Irish Presidency as a means of building up new neighbours in the south and east, was that it would build a different kind of stabilisation agreement and a new understanding of the benefits for the countries in question in dealing with the European Union, while not moving to EU membership. Ukraine would be the clearest country on the agenda. Other people have a different, more expansive view and would be prepared to enter another round of enlargement involving several of these countries.

As Deputies will be aware, a number of the countries involved in the new neighbourhood agenda, which includes Morocco and other countries in the Mediterranean region, aspire to European Union membership or as close to it as they can get. Having moved from nine, to 12, to 15 to nearly 30 members, I do not see how we could start another round of enlargement which would take membership up to 30 or 40 members without first introducing the changes necessary for the European Union to function which have not been formalised because of difficulties with the draft constitution. Those who hold another opinion are entitled to it but I think they are ill advised.

I have colleagues who have an expansive view of the nature of Europe's frontiers and think the continent has no end. In recent years, under Commission Presidents Santer, Prodi and now Barroso, I have said that somebody needs to start drawing a line because otherwise — Deputy Rabbitte will not disagree with me on this — pressure builds somewhere and suddenly one must sign up because it would be a terrible disappointment for a country if one did not move on.

With regard to budget and other arrangements people say we must decrease the budget. Most of the large member states were in the 1% club this time and wanted to go back on the financial perspectives. Fortunately they were driven on with the help of Chancellor Angela Merkel. One cannot keep pressurising the Commission to fund the European Union and provide programmes, plans, objectives and aims and then decide not to finance it. The new neighbourhood initiative should be used rather than having endless pressure for enlargement.

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