Shane Ross (Dublin South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Thomas Pringle for bringing forward this motion. It is particularly timely given that the Taoiseach is representing Ireland in Europe today. I was somewhat surprised to hear that Deputy Olivia Mitchell has accused Deputy Pringle of sedition in tabling the motion. That seems a rather extreme reaction, particularly as the wording has echoes of a speech that was made from the Park recently. To associate the President of this country with sedition seems to be going a little too far.

The motion is extraordinarily welcome because it revives to some extent the need for Europe to provide visionaries and for this nation and its Government to have a vision of what Europe should be. In recent times, by contrast, all that has been happening in Europe is fire-fighting. The Irish Presidency has been marked by a failure to achieve any of its objectives as it instead engaged in that same fire-fighting, some of which was inevitable but a great deal of which was not successful. It was most welcome, in the midst of all this fire-fighting, that we had a magnificent speech from the President of this country setting out his vision for the future of Europe. It is a speech, unfortunately, that has not been taken up by those in the Labour Party who were, once upon a time, committed to the types of ideals put forth by President Higgins. Now, however, they are prepared to take a line which represents a fairly slavish adherence to the groupthink to which Deputies Finian McGrath and Richard Boyd Barrett have referred.

It is very sad that Europe is now marked by crisis after crisis, whereas originally, as President Higgins observed repeatedly in his speech, it was marked by vision after vision. Europe has indeed been successful in its primary objective of preventing another world war. Since achieving that objective, however, it seems to have lost its way. Deputy Pringle's motion speaks of the subservience to the eurozone and the focus on the preservation of the euro. Survival of the European idea and fiscal integration seem to be the only objectives of the Union today. That position is not in any way reflective of an ideal but is merely a practical, German-driven objective to which Ireland seems to be paying a great deal of subservience.

What the President was saying so eloquently in his speech from the Park - which, for some reason, has not been debated in the House nor taken up by his former Labour Party colleagues - was that Europe lacks democratic accountability. When he mentioned fiscal technocracy he was referring to the various institutions in Europe which are dictating the pace of progress to democratically elected leaders. This was not, one assumes, simply a reference to the German hegemony, to which he referred almost directly, as well as the French hegemony and others, but also to the fact that those ideals on which we in this country have always placed great value, including citizenship, are not being pursued by the Government in this country, although he failed to name that Government specifically. Where are the ideals of the European founders today? What is the Taoiseach, as President of Europe, saying about those ideals? I have not heard the news today but it was prefaced quite clearly that his intention was to defend Ireland's status as a tax haven. He intended, it seems, at once to deny that status and to defend our record as a place where tax advantages are taken by foreign multinational companies.

This begs an important question. Why is Ireland permanently on the back foot in Europe? Why is our Presidency being marked by the fact that we are again on the back foot? Why is the Taoiseach, as President of Europe, having to defend our record when he should instead be promoting those ideals for which he has always apparently stood? Why is he not achieving the things he said he would achieve? Where are the jobs? Where is the growth? What are the achievements of the Irish Presidency? What has come of the declaration he made this time last year, on 30 June, that there would be an end to the connection between banking and sovereign debt? That has not happened; in fact, it is going backward. Any such disconnection has been denied by those in Europe who are showing the lead to other countries. What is so disappointing in all of this is that Ireland, in its current pivotal position in Europe, has not only failed to deliver on those objectives it set itself but is also failing to pursue openly the great vision which the President of Ireland showed to his colleagues in this House just a few weeks ago.

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