Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

The 2020 strategy has been adopted at the previous European Council meeting. There will be a detailed legislative response at European and other levels regarding that. I accept Deputy Perry's point that there is an increasing body of legislation and directives that require scrutiny. Under the Lisbon treaty we now have a greater degree of involvement by national parliaments. In the past it was the case that directives were already adopted and it was a question of trying to work out the impact thereafter. A major amount of work is put on the Joint Committee on European Scrutiny by the Lisbon treaty provisions . I accept it is important that in respect of important areas of legislation we deal with them in as timely a fashion as possible. Much of the legislation and regulations are not contentious or germane to the central economic or social issues. It is incumbent on committees and Departments to liaise with the European Commission Directorates to try to ensure that work that is in preparation that has the potential impact to which the Deputy referred would be considered and that where an input is required by both Parliament and Departments we should arrange for that to be done. The point is well made.

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