Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

Last week's meeting of the European Council was the latest in an increasingly lengthy series of crisis meetings. Its primary objective was again to find a way of containing the threat of a significant sovereign debt default by showing how the leaders are committed to comprehensive and credible action. As even the most basic look at the events and commentary since Friday suggests, this objective was not met. No significant new measures were announced. The leaders failed to address any of the identified area of dispute and no sense of energy or determination resulted from the meeting. Between December and March there was a definite urgency with the communiqué drafted for the 11 March Eurogroup meeting drawing this together into concrete actions. That text addressed short, medium and long-term issues and it was designed to be swiftly implemented. This has not happened. The number of vital decisions that have been put off for another day is confirmation of what many are now calling the real European Union economic strategy - kick the can down the road and hope something turns up.

The Taoiseach's approach to the summit was once again surprising. He raised issues of specific importance to Ireland in a way which was designed more for media briefing than achieving anything. He agreed a text concerning Ireland's interest rate which is a significant step backwards but claimed it as a victory. Unbelievably, it remains the case that, after more than 110 days, the Taoiseach has yet to seek or hold a substantive bilateral meeting with a eurozone leader.

Following this summit, Europe is in a situation where its leaders have left in place funding conditions they agreed in March are unsustainable; have agreed a new ECB President without discussing any reform of the bank or challenging the new president about his views; have not given a sense of providing clarity on Greece's situation; and have failed to consider issues relating to non-sovereign debt in the eurozone. The decision of the Council to circulate a glossy brochure about a new €250 million building for itself was, at best, foolish and, at worst, a signal of a complete lack of understanding of the current situation of Europe and the Union. For people who passionately believe in the European ideal, this is a depressing situation and there is no doubt that a significant intervention is required by leaders over the next two months to make sure we do not reach another moment of truth in September.

The situation in Greece rightly received the bulk of attention prior to the summit but it is not clear that anything new was progressed beyond the agreements reached at ECOFIN the previous Monday. When communiqués from these meetings state, "It was agreed by the leaders...", the matter has often not been raised and it was agreed before they turned up in Brussels. Irrespective of the nature of support programmes and the handling of debt, further major fiscal and economic reform is required in Greece, something which its government freely acknowledges.

Prime Minister Papandreou is a highly knowledgeable, competent and sincere man. Both within Greece and internationally, he has worked tirelessly to help his country. Even though he is a socialist and he would like to take more politically popular steps, he clearly wants to do the right thing. In light of this, the leaders of Europe should show much more consideration in the language they use in talking about Greece and its leadership. It serves no useful purpose to question the sincerity of the Greek Government. Equally, the best approach to the opposition of many Greeks to economic reform is not to lecture but to engage.

The revised proposal for the European Stability Mechanism is good and the proposal to remove preferential creditor status is important. It should be of considerable assistance to Greece. What is not yet fully clear is whether the issue of the sustainability of debt has been adequately addressed. As we witnessed last year, the threat of contagion from either a badly conceived or partly executed measure is real. The Vienna initiative style of debt roll-over is worth trying and the move yesterday by President Sarkozy and the French banks is welcome. A substantial lengthening of maturities and improvement of the terms of Greece's debt is essential.

The threat of the ratings agencies to deem this to be a de facto default is both wrong and a disgrace. The lack of even the merest hint of self-reflection about their role in the current crisis is amazing. They are supposed to provide guidance, not to be enforcers of an inflexible, damaging and self-fulfilling approach. If there is no legally forced restructuring, then threatening to call a milder initiative a default is simply wrong. While their lax policies provided a foundation for the financial crisis, their new more rigid policy could make it much worse. The reform and regulation of the ratings agencies should be returned to the top of the agenda for finance Ministers.

As the Taoiseach confirmed last week, he did not seek the inclusion on the agenda of any item relating to Ireland. He chose not to undertake a substantive bilateral meeting with any Head of State or Government involved in deciding matters relating to support for Ireland. What he did do was commit his staff to another round of briefing journalists with exaggerated and self-serving details about every real or imagined development.

A difficultly has developed regarding how the Taoiseach describes his international contacts. When he visited London in April, he claimed in an address to senior financial personnel that he had held meetings with Chancellor Merkel and President Sarkozy. When he was asked about this in the Dáil, he rowed back and admitted that the so-called meeting involved nothing more than briefly talking at the side of a busy Council chamber. On his way into the EPP meeting he told Irish journalists that there might be a breakthrough on the interest rate because "a form of words is being worked on". This was quickly corrected by an official who said, "there's always a form of words being worked on". Later that evening, we had the almost surreal situation of the Taoiseach praising himself for telling leaders about the many virtues of this year's budget. He neglected to say that he voted and campaigned against the same budget.

As is being revealed every day on issues from the local to the international, when the Taoiseach said repeatedly during the election, "my only concern is polling day", he was telling the truth. The problem is that he has taking his campaign tactics into Government with him. The attempt to spin everything is being found out. This is why the Taoiseach chose to announce and give a title to his "Gallic Spat" with President Sarkozy, thereby exaggerating a far from unique encounter in order to polish his image as a tough new leader. The clear and damaging outcome of this public grandstanding is indisputable.

In April the Taoiseach announced that he was holding the first bilateral meeting in a "major diplomatic initiative" which he was going to lead. That meeting has so far been the only one. Instead of undertaking a tour of capitals, or taking up President Sarkozy on either of his two invitations to visit Paris, the Taoiseach has preferred to stay in Dublin and deliver regular and false attacks on the diplomatic activities of recent years.

Last week the Taoiseach had another brief encounter with President Sarkozy. Yesterday he refused to say how long it lasted. What is not in doubt is that all that emerged was an agreement to continue to leave matters to officials. Given the amount of time the Taoiseach has spent attacking the number of roles filled by Irish officials during past European negotiations, this confirms that he has had an irony bypass.

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