Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I will try to address the issues Deputies have raised, perhaps beginning with Deputy Canney as he is here and has just spoken.

While I agree with Deputy Canney's perspective about rural Ireland being reflected in the European Union, I remind him that it is the sons and daughters of rural Ireland who are representing Ireland in the political institutions in Europe. It is the sons and daughters of rural Ireland who are sitting with me, the Taoiseach or the range of Ministers at the European Council meetings. Sons and daughters of rural Ireland are representing it as MEPs, who come every part of Ireland. They are representing Ireland in the European Parliament, the permanent representation, and all of the different meetings that happen to advance legislation in the Commission. There are Irish representatives there at every stage. We discuss it here and we discuss it in our committees, and there is a democratic continuum all the time about the voice of every part of Europe but particularly Ireland and rural Ireland. We are part of that legislative making.

I agree with the Deputy that we have to always improve our communication. That is a never-ending task, and we try to do that. However, we must not separate ourselves in a "them and us" way with regard to Europe. We are Europe, and it is our people who are negotiating in the best possible way for Irish interests at every time, as well as moving the European project on further.

I also agree with the Deputy that it should be a world focused on peace, not security, but unfortunately we have an aggressor of the type we have in Russia, and the acts it has committed. There have been extraordinary human rights abuses in Ukraine, including the taking of somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 children from Ukraine to Russia. They are stealing those children, keeping them, taking away their Ukrainian identities and making them Russian, forcibly taking them from their parents and adopting them into Russian families as Russia takes Ukrainian sovereign territory and destroys energy and critical civilian infrastructure. Ukraine has lost 68% of its energy-generating capacity. There are, I am informed, no glass factories left. There are very few windows in the areas that are bombed. It is going to be an unlivable winter in Ukraine, and that is deliberate. It is deliberate so that Russia can again weaponise migration right across Europe and force more Ukrainian refugees to Ireland and the rest of Europe.

This is deliberate and it is happening now, and so the security challenge is very different. I wish that we were not having any of these conversations but that is why, as Deputies have raised, security and the considerations around it is the new focus of the European Union. It is because of that, and because of the increased hybrid threats happening right across the Baltic states. My colleague, the Latvian foreign minister, says that it is not about a physical war but that the other war has begun. There are hundreds of cyberattacks in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania every day against private and state interests. Some of them get through and my colleagues there have to defend against this every single day. At the same time, they have to defend against misinformation about Ukrainian refugees, or this notion that somehow we will send the Ukrainian refugees back to the safe parts of Ukraine, and that this is an acceptable foreign policy at a time when it is not possible to determine what those parts are or what they are going to be. There is the disruption of weaponised migration, bringing people to the borders and forcing them across. It is not organic migration but weaponised migration. All of this is happening at the same time in a totally co-ordinated way that is designed to damage the democratic project that is the European Union.

Yes, we have differences on how Europe should go here or there but we are full participants in Europe and we make our voice heard, and heard loudly. This is particularly the case with regard to world peace and Gaza, and a number of Deputies have raised that so I will address it. Yesterday, at the General Affairs Council I took the strongest position on this, and Ireland consistently takes it. This includes the utter condemnation of Hamas and of the Israeli Government for the actions it has taken, and persistently raising the trade agreements, as the Leas-Cheann Comhairle said. The former Taoiseach, Deputy Leo Varadkar, raised it in February; the Taoiseach, Deputy Simon Harris, raised it in April; and I raised it yesterday. We are the country that is doing this. I was in Austria as part of my work as Minister of State with responsibility for European affairs last week, and a random man in the hotel where I was staying thanked me for Ireland's position on Palestine. It is known even in Austria, which takes a different position, and there are very different positions in Europe on this. My Czechian colleague took a completely different position to us yesterday. However, we have managed to negotiate Europe towards the Irish position, which is about an immediate ceasefire. We got unanimous language on an immediate ceasefire. We did not have that a number of months ago, and it has moved to that position.

Yes, Deputies are right to say we have not got a response to our position on the trade agreement, but that does not mean we have stopped raising it. We have persistently raised that because we believe it is important and the right direction for the European Union. We are advocating for this strongly at every possible opportunity. We will continue to do that and work with colleagues to try to set out that position.

The broader position around security has to be stated and restated again with regard to what is happening in Ukraine. In recent months, we have seen hybrid attacks targeting the EU and its partners involving intimidation, sabotage, foreign information manipulation and interference, disinformation, malicious cyberactivities and as I said, the instrumentalisation - which is a fancy word for weaponisation - of migrants. This activity is totally unacceptable, and the European Union has to respond as a whole with firmness, determination and tangible action with all of the tools at its disposal.

We are making progress with respect to our capacity to counter this type of threat with the new EU diplomatic toolboxes on hybrid foreign interference and cybersecurity. The hybrid rapid-response teams will add new capability. My Lithuanian colleague, just yesterday, has looked for us to approach this even further because he is seeing the effect of this on a daily basis in Lithuania. We also have to consider whatever other options there are to respond to this Russian activity. The nature of that threat requires strong co-operation between like-minded countries and in that context, we are supportive of strengthening EU-NATO co-operation on hybrid threats because of the very real impact they are having on democracy and activity right across Europe.

Deputies have raised the importance of enlargement, and a number of them have raised the western Balkans. It is very important to think about the western Balkans. We really welcome, for example, not just the progress that Bosnia and Herzegovina has made but the steps which, in very difficult circumstances, other countries have made. Kosovo has made very significant developments and we have been active in calling for it to be able to join the Council of Europe and take further steps. We really support enlargement and the reason we support it is because we benefited from EU membership as a small country with an underdeveloped economy. We have seen the benefits in terms of both political stability and the opportunity to grow our economy and job opportunities for people who live here, both Irish people and other people who come to live here. We would want to see other countries have the same opportunity to develop.

However, we should think in particular about the geopolitical position of those countries and how close they are to Russia. We must consider what is happening to Georgia, which is such a pro-European country that only wants to talk about European integration but, at the same time, has a destabilising Russian influence in its current Georgian Dream government. Consider what is happening about the threat to Moldova. We began the intergovernmental accession conference yesterday, which is enormously positive for Moldova. It has had to take steps against a backdrop of oligarchs, disinformation and Russian disruption. There will be a vacuum in the Continent if we do not complete the enlargement process for the western Balkan states.

Deputies are right to highlight the drift that occurred over the previous two decades but the European Union has to take steps to bring in the western Balkans in a co-ordinated, rules-based and merit-based process. There is no question about that. However, if it does not, a vacuum will be created and others will step in. They will step in in the same way as this threat we have seen right across the eastern front, as it were. This is a real, live, existing problem and Europe has to think differently about it. In Ireland, we are not doing anything other than committing to our position of military non-alignment. However, that does not mean we do not need various weapons and other materials to defend our sovereign territory.

At present in Europe, it is difficult to procure weapons and the things that the Defence Forces would need because so much has gone to Ukraine from different countries. The supply chain is going towards Ukraine because of the considerable need there. Our defence budget is currently about €1.2 billion. Another neutral country in Europe, Austria, spends €3.3 billion on its defence. It is a much higher proportion of its GDP. We will have to increase our spending. To do that, we will want to join joint procurement models so that we can have better access to supply chains and we can achieve better prices for the Irish taxpayer. That does not mean we are creating a military-industrial complex, whatever that actually is. It means we are defending the interests of the Irish people and we are doing it in a strategic, intelligent and cost-effective way, because we have to.

These are the steps we are trying to advance on behalf of Irish people in defence of Ireland in the best possible way within the European Union. We do it every week. We are doing it together as Irish people. There is no "them and us". The sons and daughters of rural Ireland are representing Ireland in Brussels. The civil servants and political representatives are the people who are advancing Irish interests every week. It is not just the political representatives such as me, the Taoiseach and others, but Irish people doing it on behalf of Ireland. We must remember that solidarity within Ireland and for Ireland within Europe. We do exceptionally well because of our committed European status and the collaborative way in which we work with our partners. We advance our interests in a careful, strategic way. We do it well and we must remember the benefit we get from that excellent work.

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