Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

The Swedish EU Presidency had been involved in a series of discussions in the days previous to the Council meeting. Having listened to all member states, it put forward one nomination for the post of Presidency of the Council of the European Union based on the broadest consensus available. Similarly, it put one nomination for the post of High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. One would have been notified about it informally prior to the meeting beginning. The formal position was then put at the meeting.

A detailed proposal on the size of the external action service must come from the high representative in early 2010. That will be then considered by the Council for the purposes of developing the service. It will comprise representatives from all member states but it will have to be worked out proportionately.

A commitment was sought by the EU Presidency for Ireland to make a fair, reasonable and proportioned contribution to the amount for the fast-start climate finance package. In discussions with the presidency, it was confirmed that an amount of approximately €100 million over three years would be regarded as fair and reasonable on Ireland's part. The Government will have to decide as to how this will be funded in due course. The figure has been put down as a negotiating position by the EU as it goes into the final week of the Copenhagen summit to indicate the seriousness of the EU governments' intent.

It will involve additional moneys but it may also involve some existing moneys that are yet to be decided when programmes are reoriented in the future. That is a matter for a Government decision. We were asked to make a commitment at the Council meeting and I made that.

The existing European Commission will re-evaluate the existing Lisbon strategy's ten-year economic programme. A-lessons-learned paper will emerge from this process. The incoming Commission will develop proposals to be named EU 2020. At the dinner after last week's meeting, the incoming Council President indicated he believes the Council discussing broad economic strategy will be the most important issue in his term over the next two and a half years.

During 2010 an EU 2020 strategy will be formulated which will feed into the discussions on the budgetary process after 2013, talks on which are to begin in 2011. As the Lisbon strategy will end in 2010, the idea is to begin political discussions now and consider Commission proposals for the development of an EU 2020 strategy. This will form the basis of discussions on the budget the following year.

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