Marc Ó Cathasaigh (Waterford, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I have always considered myself a European. From early on, it was part of my self-definition. I was an Irish citizen first and foremost and within that, there are local and tribal loyalties like the address lines on an envelope marking townland, parish, county but in the wider frame, I am a European, a member of the European Economic Community as it was and, now, of the European Union. I have been a beneficiary of the four freedoms in a Europe without borders, particularly the right of free movement of people. I have worked in Germany and Italy without hindrance or impediment. Indeed, I was in Italy for the changeover to the euro in 2002. In Ireland, we had cashed in our punts by the end of the first week in January whereas the Italians clung to their beloved lira right up to the six-week deadline, a small anecdotal measure of the high regard we have for the European project in Ireland.

We are one of the most pro-EU member states, according to Eurobarometer polling. We have seen and felt the improvements in our own country derived from our membership of the EU, socially, economically and environmentally. It is to our shame that progress in this country on social and environmental issues has often come at the insistence of Europe rather than through leadership on our own part from this House. I refer, for example, to the water framework directive and the general data protection regulation, GDPR, which is among the most important and robust EU legislation in the last decade.

We have also known peace here in our own country and across the EU and have experienced a period of relative stability, free from warfare. Europe had torn itself asunder for centuries and the European project emerged from the smouldering ruins of a continent that self-immolated through two world wars of almost unthinkable savagery. I am sure Robert Schuman has been much quoted already today. He was a pragmatic dreamer who understood that there can be power in the prosaic. He argued that Europe would be built through concrete achievements which first create a de facto solidarity. In 1998, John Hume acknowledged the European Union as "the best example in the history of the world of conflict resolution". He argued that the peoples of Europe "had created institutions which respected their diversity ... but allowed them to work together in their common and substantial economic interest. They spilt their sweat and not their blood and by doing so broke down the barriers of distrust of centuries and the new Europe has evolved and is still evolving , based on agreement and respect for difference". Both men knew that the European Union was not an inevitability but a conscious and creative act of the imagination, rooted in the practical and pragmatic pursuit of a shared common good underpinned by respect and a tolerance for our differences. We are both the same and different and it is in our diversity and solidarity that we are strong. However, our union is not inevitable and I wonder if we are forgetting that through long habituation. In Hungary we see sustained pressure on democratic institutions, civil society and the rule of law, while in Poland there has been a crackdown on LGBTQI+ rights, attacks on independent media and a near total ban on access to abortion in January of this year. Our closest neighbour, with which we have the longest and deepest cultural ties, has chosen to leave the European Union. Much of the debate in the referendum and the subsequent fallout was tinged with nationalist rhetoric and a focus on borders.

To my mind, the European project is as essential today as ever and we must re-engage in a conscious way with that continuous and creative process of making and remaking our shared European identity. If the European Union has been a force to the good for human rights and workers' rights within our borders, which it has been in the main, then let us fiercely defend those advancements and seek to project them beyond our borders. In our trade agreements with others, let us insist on due diligence when it comes to human rights and insist that the intrinsic dignity of the person is preserved in the supply chains of those products we allow into our markets. Let us vindicate the UN's sustainable development goals here in Europe and work in partnership with governments in the developing world to help them do the same. In the immediate term and in the teeth of this pandemic, let us use every lever, including the sharing of materials, manufacturing knowledge and intellectual property, to accelerate the global vaccine roll-out and safeguard us all from the prospect of vaccine escape. Let us face up to our shared responsibility as one of the most developed parts of the globe to deal with the existential threat of biodiversity and climate breakdown. The European Union, and Ireland as a member state, must achieve and exceed its climate ambitions and, in doing so, support a just transition to a climate neutral economy in Europe and further afield. This can and should be the practical and pragmatic project that binds us as a union to the common good for another 70 years and more. Let us continue to invest in that collective act of the imagination that allows me to call myself a European citizen.

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