Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

This week's summit could be a profound one in setting the direction of Europe for the next five years. It will decide whether the European Union will again be a driver of growth or will double down on policies that have failed and will continue to fail. At every stage in the past five years, Europe's leaders have failed to show the urgency or ambition desperately needed by countries caught in the greatest economic crisis for 70 years. There has been a stubborn refusal to accept when radical changes are required. Worst of all, real damage has been done to the foundations of a Union that can only be effective when members understand the need for solidarity and respect.

Today, the Union in general and the eurozone in particular are faced with the threat of deflation and falling growth rates. Even the most optimistic projections assert that employment and living standards will be squeezed for the foreseeable future if current policies are maintained. The economic forecasts of every international agency claim that the European economy is weak and threatened with significant problems. The President of the European Central Bank, ECB, has stated that extraordinary measures may soon be required to stop a new recession. This is the background to the summit and it demands a far more serious response than we have heard so far from the Taoiseach and his fellow members of the Council.

In area after area, the Union's policies are simply not delivering. There is no plan for charting a new course. The European institutions badly need new leaders who understand the scale of the crisis and are not obsessed with justifying the status quo. It is the discussions about who these leaders will be that will determine whether this summit is a success or another missed opportunity.

What is worst about the process so far is that the debate has all been about who will get the jobs and not what they will do in the jobs. There is no doubt that last month's elections saw large portions of the citizenry of Europe expressing their dissatisfaction with the current situation in the Union. As with most election commentary, many people are describing as winners groups that came nowhere near winning majority support. Let us get some perspective. In Ireland and Europe as a whole, more than two thirds of people voted for parties and candidates that were broadly pro-EU. Those who want to roll back or even abolish the Union did well in many places, but they are the voice of the minority.

In our election, the exit poll confirmed what had been shown in every survey that had been carried out in recent years, namely, the Irish people want a Union that is more effective in doing the jobs we need it to do. We do not want the right-wing vision of a skeleton free trade area that maximises competition and minimises work and living standards. We do not want the extreme left vision of massively regulated markets and anti-business rhetoric. We do not want to dismantle the hard-won progress achieved over the past 60 years. What the Irish people time and again have said is that we want a Union that works better, understands the need for deep reform, takes credible action to support growth and living standards, talks less and achieves more.

The first and most effective way of responding to this is in the three major appointments that are due to be finalised in the coming weeks. I have nothing against Jean-Claude Juncker, but it is absurd to claim that he is somehow the democratic choice of the people of Europe to head the European Commission. He has a substantial claim to be considered as the leading candidate for the role of Commission President, but to assert that any alternative would be anti-democratic is to adopt the fiction that these were a single pan-European election where citizens voted for both the Parliament and Commission at the same time.

It remains the case that Ireland has not received full justice in its case for relief of the full impact of bank-related debts. Every independent report has made the point that the scale of these debts was significantly affected by EU policies that were doggedly enforced between 2008 and 2010 but have since been abandoned. Had the policies in place today been adopted then, there would have been no Irish bailout. During those years, Jean-Claude Juncker was president of the Eurogroup and was frequently a loud public advocate for the failed policies that caused so much harm. Did the Taoiseach seek commitments from Mr. Juncker before announcing his total support for the man? Did he seek assurances of support for Irish debt relief or did he just jump on the bandwagon? Equally important, did he seek any information from Mr. Juncker about how he proposed to revitalise the Commission and the Union?

I welcome Mr. Juncker’s intention to push for a social impact assessment to be added to the narrow financial provisions of existing budgetary regulations and bailout provisions.

If this is a signal of a wider radicalism, then he may be a good choice. However, his failure to comment on a wide range of other issues, such as the complete inadequacy of the banking union, is a cause for concern. He is also right that dealing with Britain’s threats to the Union must be a priority, but he is wrong in talking about the Single Market as the priority in this regard. If what we get is further pressure to gut the EU budget, to withdraw from vital social and economic activities, then it will be a major step backwards. It is hard to fault Mr. Junker for not saying more because our own Government has given no specifics about where it sees the future development of the Union.

The choice for Council President may actually be just as important as the Commission post. The national presidencies are becoming less influential and the Council has so far failed to work effectively in its much larger format. The agenda is increasingly getting diverted into formalities and minor incremental changes driven by advance agreements brokered between a handful of states. The Council must reassert itself as a forum where all states are treated fairly and where decisions do not have to wait for a major crisis before anyone does anything.

As far as the role of High Commissioner is concerned, a strong personality who shows a commitment to European values and respect for the views of all member states is required. In the past year there has been much talk of a united European approach to shared foreign policy concerns, but this has been reflected very little in reality. Catherine Ashton has done well in setting up the European External Action Service. What has not yet happened is the adoption of a common understanding of what the service can achieve for us all. Whoever takes her place must be of senior status and capable of obliging the larger member states to take him or her seriously.

The summit is due once again to talk about the crisis in Ukraine. Due to the sheer number of international crises at the moment, Ukraine is receiving much less attention, but the situation continues to be very grave. For the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union, a European country has been unilaterally partitioned by a powerful neighbour which believes in its right to dominate all former satellites. When taking control of Crimea, Russia adopted a strategy of acting on the ground while angrily denying it in public. Since then the Russian President has confirmed that his government was lying when it denied actions by its troops. It is difficult to see circumstances in which Russia can be forced to reverse its partitioning of Crimea from Ukraine; however, we cannot let that distract us from recognising what is now happening there. The free media in Crimea is being destroyed. Civil society organisations are under daily pressure. The largest ethnic minority, the Tatars, are facing particular discrimination, with Russian efforts to actively undermine the traditional commemoration of the exile of Tatars under the Soviet regime. It is in fact a criminal offence to publicly state in Crimea that one disagrees with the Russian annexation. In eastern Ukraine, Russian-supported groups continue to push for the further partition of the country. The last time Europe saw such intimidation of a small state by a nuclear superpower was in 1968. Our history teaches us what can happen when a powerful neighbour refuses to respect the territorial integrity of a weaker state. We must stand with the democratically elected government of Ukraine and say to Russia that it will face real consequences if it continues.

The ongoing use of gas supplies in support of state policy by certain countries has only reinforced the need for Europe to get serious about both energy independence and climate change. During the recession there was a major backing away from these objectives in much of Europe. Our Government has been a leader in trying to make sure that whatever is done about sustainable energy comes nowhere near matching the rhetoric. Energy is on the agenda for the summit and it is to be hoped that it will involve some concrete action.

The summit will also sign off, as the Taoiseach has said, on the latest part of the ongoing European semester process for co-ordinating economic and fiscal policy. This is unlikely to get any attention but it is still very significant. For all the fine talk about supporting jobs and growth, the recommendations to countries that will be agreed by the Taoiseach and his colleagues see a doubling down on the policy of austerity for all. There are places where fiscal reality means there is no alternative to running a tight policy; however, in much of Europe a boost to demand due to looser budgets is exactly what is needed. To try and return to sustainable growth through monetary policy alone is simply ludicrous. It is not credible in any way.

The European Central Bank’s recent plans are unlikely to have a practical impact unless they are soon followed by full-scale quantitative easing. The bank's president, Mario Draghi, is clearly committed to doing as much as he can, but what is missing can be seen from a stubborn adherence to a policy which continues to suppress demand, leading to low growth, low inflation and low confidence. Why has Ireland refused to join Prime Minister Renzi of Italy in calling for a more growth-oriented approach to budgets? Why have we sat on the sidelines and nodded through recommendations which will achieve nothing but to undermine growth and limit living standards?

In starting this summit the Council will quite rightly remember one of those conflicts which made the 20th century the bloodiest in Europe’s history. It is absolutely correct to say that the European Union has given our continent an unprecedented period of peace between states. This should be noted and celebrated at the Council. What leaders would do well to remember is that the greatest cause of the First World War was a failure of leadership. Whether they were dynastic or democratic, Europe’s heads of state and government a hundred years ago could not see where their narrow view of national interests and stubborn adherence to failed strategies was leading them. It was a senseless and destructive war. Historians have shown repeatedly how millions died in a conflict between states too proud to understand their common interests.

Today there is a deep sense of drift in Europe. The extremes are still in the minority, but they have grown in strength. We cannot afford more of the same - more timidity, more delay. We need the leaders of Europe to recognise the deep crisis to which they have contributed and to commit to reforming both their work and the policies which are so clearly not working.

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