Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On Deputy Martin's comment that Europe is not emerging from the crisis that has befallen it and that it is falling deeper into recession, he knows something about this from his past experience and what did not happen that might have happened. It is fair to say that around the European Council table very different views are expressed by different Prime Ministers, some elected in different circumstances beholden to a party or a number of parties in minority situations. Many of them are not in a position to give agreement to particular programmes or proposals in that they might not be able to get them through their parliaments.

It is necessary for Europe to follow through on the decision that it makes. We can have all the economic arguments, theories and projections that people like and they might be great fun for economists and those who pursue economic theories, but the problem facing the politician is to make decisions that impact on his or her economies for their betterment and that will lead to job creation and growth. For instance, it is true to say that decisions taken by the European Council in respect of the development of the European Union, both in the eurozone and in the Union, have not been followed through in a number of cases, but many of these are very complex. We discussed previously the question of the setting up of the euro while not having the facilities in place to develop it afterwards and develop the Union as people might have imagined. That is why, for instance, the question of a banking union is now one that is central to the argument that we need this facility to deal with a fundamental crisis issue in Europe, namely, that surrounding the banks and their operations. That is why the single supervisory mechanism has now been agreed in terms of its architecture to take effect next March. That is why the next stage of banking union is bank resolution and that matter is under discussion at the Eurogroup and ECOFIN. The third element of that is a euro-wide guarantee in respect of deposits. That is a complex and technical series of arguments that is being followed through. We would like to see it happen much quicker in the interests of everybody but that is not practically possible. Nor will it happen that we will have a broad range of radical rethinking of where Europe stands now. It is very necessary that European leadership follows through on the decisions it has made and demonstrates to the peoples of the European Union that there is a follow through on decisions made in their interests. As a matter of course, we should follow through on these decisions and not just talk about some alternatives. They come up at every meeting but I think leadership demonstrates to people that Europe is serious about its business - I said that again last night when I along with the Tánaiste got progress on Europe's discussions on the MFF and the deficit for 2012-13 - as opposed to having endless, and I mean endless, arguments about different economic theories that may or may not be relevant. For now Europe has made its decisions and it should follow through on those, and any new policy should be additional to the decisions that have already been made.

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