David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to have a discussion on the future of Europe. It is timely and important that we take stock of where Europe is at. Ireland and smaller countries have to play their role, have their place and are central to what should be a reform agenda within the European Union. My party believes the entire island of Ireland should stay in the European Union, that the European Union has been good for Ireland and that there is much we can celebrate in being a member of it. Equally, my party has a critical engagement with the European Union, rightly so when one considers that many citizens across the Union are becoming more concerned about the centralisation of power and, as Deputy Billy Kelleher said, a drift towards a more federal Europe and the building, not of a social Europe but a more undemocratic Europe where the big institutions have far too much power and people who are not elected to positions are making decisions that effect the lives of others and cannot be held to account. We all know what happens when that happens. In this state we can point to many examples and the most recent scandals to see that it does not work. However, the thing Deputy Billy Kelleher left out in his contribution is that the creeping federalisation of Europe did not happen by chance. It did not happen overnight, it happened with the passing of every single treaty that his party supported and championed. All of the treaties that gave the big institutions the powers they have, that created the undemocratic Europe we have and the federal Europe the Deputy now decries are treaties his party went out and sold with gusto.

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