Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I am sharing my time with Deputies Allen and Burke but I am not sure it is worthwhile.

All politicians must accept some responsibility for the outcome of the referendum. On the face of it, the treaty was rejected but the vote was also a message to the Establishment telling us that we were never really persuaded of the intrinsic value of the European project and that we never really considered ourselves to be enthusiastic or committed members of the Community, working together in the Irish interest. If we really were convinced, people would at least have been predisposed to voting in favour of every treaty and listening to the exhortations of political representatives. Such goodwill in favour of the European project simply is not apparent. We discovered, in respect of a treaty that was not momentous in any way, that we had to start from scratch and persuade citizens again of the value of the Union and overcome very deep-rooted suspicion and genuine concern regarding anything that smacked of more of the European Union.

As a committed European, it does not give me any satisfaction to outline these facts. Citizens may have fears concerning geographical separation or our history of foreign domination and may be innately suspicious of sharing hard-won self-government but politicians have fed those fears during the years. They have taken credit for the popular decisions of the European Union and denied responsibility for those that were unpopular, although they were part of the decision-making process.

People are disengaged from the European Union. The constant, insidious distancing of ourselves from responsibility for jointly made decisions has had its effect on the Irish psyche and helped to reinforce pre-existing reservations about the European project as a whole. We, as politicians, have a responsibility to stop making utterances in the interests of short-term expediency that distance ourselves from responsibility for EU decisions.

Ministers have a responsibility to talk to us about decisions made in the European Union such that those people in whose names they are made will know what is happening. The media have a role to play in this regard. The Irish press corps in Brussels is smaller than that of Croatia. RTE devoted a couple of minutes to this matter after midnight. The reality is that we are not serious about the European Union. If we really believe we want to be part of the Union, we must stop pussyfooting. We must make a committed decision as politicians and ensure the new Oireachtas channel will cover proceedings in the European Parliament.

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