Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Ross says the Taoiseach should go to the European Council meeting on Thursday and bark. The problem with Deputy Ross's approach to this issue is that it is all bark and no brain.

Let us start with what the meeting on Thursday and Friday is about. This is a special meeting of the European Council. It is not about the issues that have preoccupied the European Council over the course of the past year, which are bank debt, the euro and so on. This special meeting of the European Council is to deal with the European budget between 2014 and 2020. What are we talking about when we talk about the European budget? We are talking about a total of €1,000 billion of European money from which this country stands to gain a considerable amount in the areas of agriculture, research, education and training, communications and a range of other areas all of which are vital in growing, developing and promoting our economy. To suggest that we should approach that meeting in the way Deputy Ross outlines, using all of his elaborate and entertaining analogies, is daft. We have to approach it in a way that is sensible and benefits Ireland.

That is why I spent Monday and Tuesday of this week in Brussels, at the Foreign Affairs Council and the General Affairs Council. We had a detailed and lengthy discussion at the General Affairs Council on Monday evening about the multiannual financial framework, the European budget, up to 2020. I also had a separate meeting with President Van Rompuy to discuss not only Ireland's Presidency of the European Union next year but also the issue of the multi-annual financial framework, MFF.

A number of issues will, I hope, be decided this week at the European Council. I hope they will be decided because it is in the interests of Europe and Ireland that we get a conclusion to the budget issues and decide the type of budget the European Union will have between now and 2020. That is critical because of its implications for agriculture, the agrifood sector and the Common Agricultural Policy. We need to know the budgeting that will be available for research programmes in our universities, the tie-up with research for industry and the importance of that, in turn, in attracting investment into the country from companies that will create employment and develop links and synergies with the university sector and with research and innovation so that we can grow more jobs and have more people in employment and a better economy. These discussions are critical.

It would be helpful if, when they were coming in to address this issue, Members had at least informed themselves of the basics of what the meeting this Thursday and Friday is about. We have already made progress on the issues of the bank debt and the euro. At the June European Council meeting a decision was made to separate bank and sovereign debt. At the October European Council that was carried forward and a commitment was made that a single supervisory mechanism would be put in place and that the legislative framework for that would be completed by the end of the year.

At the Foreign Affairs Council on Monday, we discussed the appalling situation in Gaza. This country has a long and proud record of speaking for the Palestinian people and for a fair solution to the crisis in the Middle East. We have done so again on this occasion. That is why we support the efforts to bring about a ceasefire and to halt the attacks on civilians, whether in Gaza, Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. Attacks on civilians, irrespective of where they are coming from, have to stop and there has to be a ceasefire and an end to the killing of innocent people in this region, and particularly in Gaza. We know the numbers, but this is not about a comparison of numbers. It is about getting a ceasefire, which we have been advocating for some time, and getting peace talks going so that there will be a permanent settlement in this area.

What is happening there is extremely worrying. It has the potential to escalate, with all the consequences that has for the people who live in the area and for the wider region. We dealt with this issue at the Foreign Affairs Council on Monday. I expect it will be addressed again at the European Council on Thursday and Friday, because of the urgency of the situation. It is something on which Ireland has taken a strong position.

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