Lucinda Creighton (Dublin South East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I have gathered my breath. I thank the Members for the invitation to once again have the pleasure and honour of addressing the Chamber on the first two months of the Irish Presidency of the Council of the European Union. Ireland formally took over the Presidency on 1 January but, in reality, the Government has been in intensive Presidency mode since I last addressed the Seanad in late October. Throughout November, the Government had a busy schedule of visits by committees and by party political groups from the European Parliament culminating with the meeting between the Government and the Conference of Presidents of the European Parliament. In December the Cabinet approved the Irish Presidency programme, and the Tánaiste launched the Trio Presidency programme in Brussels with our partners from Lithuania and Greece. The Irish programme, For Stability, Jobs and Growth, which has been laid before the Oireachtas, was formally launched in early January in advance of the visit to Dublin by the President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy. The College of Commissioners also visited Dublin on 10 January for the traditional start-of-Presidency meeting between the European Commission and the Government.

The Government also hosted a visit to Dublin by over 60 members of the Brussels press corps. This provided members of the Government with the opportunity not only to discuss Presidency issues but also to send key messages about Ireland's economic recovery to a wide international audience. It is important to note that those journalists were from the leading publications in every member state and from candidate countries and that this generated a huge amount of features and promotional pieces in a wide variety of those leading publications across the European Union and beyond.

Following the Taoiseach's address in mid-January to the European Parliament plenary on the priorities of the Irish Presidency, Irish Ministers made 27 presentations to European Parliament committees on the Presidency programme. The programme has also been presented to our partners in other member states and I have addressed the Committee of the Regions and the European economic and social committee on our priorities.

In all our engagement with partners we have stressed that we want our Presidency to reflect the best elements of Ireland's six previous Presidencies. It will be citizen-focused, impartial, business-like and results-driven. Similarly the Irish Presidency programme contains ambitious but not unrealistic goals aimed at promoting stability, sustainable economic growth and jobs across Europe, and all of our priorities are centred around delivering a better Europe for our citizens.

The positive reaction to our Presidency priorities from partners in other member states, from the European institutions and from European civil society has been encouraging. I am also grateful for the support that we have received from this House.

One of the core objectives of the programme is to promote stability and confidence in Europe's economy through measures such as the banking union proposals and effectively implementing the EU's enhanced economic governance measures. This is necessary to provide a stable foundation of sustainable economic recovery and employment creation. We are making good progress in this regard.

The Government has also identified a range of proposals designed to stimulate growth and job creation. These include several important Single Market proposals, improved support for research and innovation across the EU, unemployment measures, particularly for young people, and widening access to education and training. We are working intensively across all Council formations to deliver on these priorities. I welcome the news from the European Commission last week that Ireland has topped the latest EU Internal Market scoreboard for transposing EU legislation into domestic law. It is only the second time a member state has got a perfect score and it is a first for Ireland. It shows that we are taking our EU responsibilities seriously and I would like to express my thanks to this House for the role it plays in scrutinising and debating EU related legislation.

Our Presidency objectives clearly reflect national political priorities but they also reflect concerns that are shared by people across the European Union. This is why making progress on these goals over the coming four months is essential for Ireland and for Europe.

We also want to ensure that our efforts leave a strong, positive legacy in the coming years. We all know how important it is for Ireland to maintain excellent relations with our partners and to demonstrate our commitment as a serious and engaged member state. We believe the effective management of the Presidency can challenge the negative perceptions about Ireland that resulted from the crisis and can show that Ireland is a capable and credible international partner.

We have almost reached the one third stage of the Presidency. While we face challenging months ahead and there is no room for complacency, the Government is broadly satisfied with progress made to date.

Let me summarise what we have achieved so far across several Council formations.

On 8 February the European Council reached agreement on the multiannual financial framework, MFF, for 2014 to 2020. It agreed an overall amount of ¤960 billion in commitment appropriations. While the overall size of the MFF has been reduced by 3.5%, importantly, CAP and cohesion spending were largely protected. Negotiations were difficult, but the outcome is a compromise with which member states are broadly satisfied.

Ireland did well. We protected our CAP allocation and secured a special allocation of ¤100 million for rural development. We also secured a special allocation of ¤100 million from cohesion funding for the Border, midlands and western region, which had been due to take a significant drop. I am particularly glad that we were able to secure ¤150 million for the PEACE programme which has supported such valuable projects in Northern Ireland and in our Border counties. There is a new youth employment initiative which will provide funding for regions with youth unemployment rates above 25%. This, unfortunately, includes both Irish regions, and I will return to this later.

Initial estimates are that Ireland will remain a net recipient for the lifetime of the new MFF. We should contribute about ¤10 billion and receive about ¤12 billion.

The European Parliament's assent is needed before the MFF can be adopted. It now falls to Ireland as President to gain this assent and we aim to conclude negotiations in Council on a new MFF regulation, based on the outcome of the European Council. We intend to do that in April and to formally present the regulation to the European Parliament. However, as holders of the Presidency we will need to engage well before that with the Parliament. Obtaining the Parliament's assent will be very challenging. I am confident, however, that with goodwill on all sides we can reach agreement on this before the end of our Presidency. I am pleased to say the Government has already initiated contacts with the European Parliament as part of our preparations for that crucial which will probably take place in April.

Timely implementation of the MFF is critical to underpin recovery across the European Union on programmes ranging from Horizon 2020 to the COSME programme to support our SMEs to cohesion and regional funding. Last week the Presidency helped to broker an agreement with the European Parliament on the so-called "two-pack" economic governance legislation which is designed to improve budgetary and economic co-ordination among euro area members. The adoption of the proposals is a Presidency priority and will contribute to our objective of promoting greater stability and confidence in the euro area through more effective economic and fiscal co-ordination.

The Presidency is also committed to ensuring the effective implementation of the European semester, the European Union's new system of economic and budgetary co-ordination, which we see as the key tool in restoring economic stability in Europe and creating the conditions for sustainable growth. The European Council will conclude and evaluate the first phase of the European semester when it meets in mid-March. It is important that national parliaments play their part in the European semester process. After the March European Council recommendations will come from the European Commission specific to each member state. In terms of accountability and legitimacy it is essential that national parliaments play their role in assessing those countries' specific recommendations and feeding in to the process before the ultimate European Council in June.

Remaining on economic and financial issues, at the first meeting of the ECOFIN Council last month, which was chaired by the Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael Noonan, a decision was taken to move forward on an enhanced co-operation basis for a financial transaction tax. Ireland will not be one of the participating countries but we are committed, in our role as Presidency, to act as an honest and impartial broker in the discussions.

The Presidency has seen welcome progress on the trade front. As Members will recall from the programme and our discussions here in late October, promoting the European Union's exports through enhanced trade agreements is an important Presidency priority for Ireland. With 90% of global economic growth taking place outside the European Union, it is essential that we seek to develop trade with key external partners. In our programme, we placed particular emphasis on making progress on a trade agreement with the United States.

On 12 February, President Obama called for a transatlantic trade and investment partnership. This has been welcomed by the Presidency and all European Union leaders. The Government will do all it can to secure its goal of achieving a formal Council mandate for the start of negotiations on an agreement. Our aim is to do that before the conclusion of our President. If we can do that it will be a hugely significant achievement because it is something that has alluded the European Union and the US not just for years but decades.

The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation will chair a meeting of EU trade Ministers in Dublin in April which will focus on driving this process forward in addition to other trade related issues. The potential benefits of a future partnership agreement are simply too great to ignore. It is estimated, very conservatively, that a successful conclusion could lead to annual benefits of more than ¤150 billion to the European Union and the United States economies. There is a huge raft of academic work which shows that the potential is much greater than that. Therefore, it is an exciting opportunity and one that we, as Presidency, are embracing.

The Presidency will also seek to build on the progress on concluding an EU-Canada free trade negotiation agreement.

Similar negotiations are also under way with several key Asian partners and Japan, Korea and others are very much on our priority list.

Remaining for a moment on international issues, the Government, in preparing the Presidency programme, also placed a strong emphasis on development and humanitarian issues, reflecting Ireland's commitment to fighting global hunger and poverty. At the recent meeting of EU development Ministers chaired by the Minister of State, Deputy Costello, agreement was reached on the resumption of ¤250 million in EU funding in 2013 to support democracy and peace in Mali and to provide assistance to displaced Malians to ensure they have access to food and other basic services. This is a very important positive step for the region and for Mali in particular. I am also looking forward to the conference being hosted by the Presidency with the Mary Robinson Foundation - Climate Justice to seek solutions to the challenges of hunger, nutrition and climate change which affect the world's poorest regions disproportionately.

The Single Market is a key Presidency priority and I am very pleased to note the signing of the unified patent court agreement last week. The agreement will provide European SMEs and other businesses with a central one-stop shop for registering and protecting patents and with improved and more cost-effective access to patent protection at European level. The EU-US trade agreement I mentioned earlier took decades to achieve, as has the unified patent court agreement. We cannot claim all the credit for it and must acknowledge the work of previous Presidencies to get it to this point. It was an historic day when the Minister, Deputy Bruton, signed it on behalf of the Irish Presidency. It is a very important leap forward for the Single Market protecting and encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship in the European Union. The Presidency is working on other outstanding issues under the Single Market Act I to promote economic competitiveness and growth.

Bringing down barriers which hinder citizen mobility across the EU is also an important Presidency focus during this European Year of Citizens. In addition to advancing a number of legislative proposals we are engaging in dialogue with citizens over the coming months about the rights we enjoy as EU citizens. I hope through this initiative we can spark a broader debate about what it means to be part of the European Union and how we would like the Union to evolve in the coming years. I want this debate to continue well beyond the Presidency and the European Year of Citizens. As many Senators are aware, in January we held the first dialogue in Dublin City Hall with approximately 200 citizens present. I and the Vice President of the European Commission, Viviane Reding, were in the hot seat and the event was very successful. More recently, the Tánaiste attended the second citizens' dialogue in Cork. I look forward to the next meeting in Galway, which I will attend on behalf of the Presidency and the Government, and many such meetings will take place in the coming months. I intend to try to engage personally at all of the events, if I can, and to encourage participation by Members of the Oireachtas, the European Parliament and the Commission. It will be a good opportunity for citizens to challenge and question and engage with public representatives and leaders at national and European level.

Not surprisingly, one question raised at these events is what are we doing to tackle unemployment, particularly youth unemployment. As Senators recall from my pre-Presidency meetings in the Seanad, the Government considers youth unemployment levels in Ireland and across Europe far too high and if we do not address them they will have very negative consequences for our families and communities and for society. This is why we have made tackling the issue a key focus for our Presidency. On 7 and 8 February the Ministers, Deputies Burton and Bruton, met their EU colleagues in Dublin to address unemployment issues and to assess ways of addressing youth unemployment more effectively. This was at the informal Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs, EPSCO, Council which took place. One of the main proposals discussed was the youth guarantee, which is aimed at ensuring that young people who are not working or studying receive an offer of employment, continuing education, an apprenticeship or a traineeship.

Based on discussions at discussions at the meeting we are hopeful that agreement will be reached at the EPSCO Council meeting due to take place later this week in Brussels.

As I mentioned earlier, the European Council has also agreed on a ¤6 billion youth employment initiative fund as part of the multi-annual financial framework for 2014-20. The funding is aimed at regions with the highest rates of youth joblessness to help get young people back to work. The Irish Presidency will work intensively to secure the European Parliament's consent to the 2014-20 budget to ensure that these funds can be mobilised without delay. Work has already begun in the European Commission in terms of firming up the proposals.

Food quality and security is of critical importance to Ireland from both a consumer perspective and as one of our major export sectors. All Senators will agree that the recent revelations on the mislabelling of food products are simply unacceptable. Following the initial discovery in January by the Irish Food Safety Authority, the pan-European scale of the problem has become apparent. This is why the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, as chair of the Agriculture and Fisheries Council, responded swiftly to address the issue and called a meeting of EU agriculture Ministers with the Commission, which agreed on a control and testing system for all member states in order to reassure consumers. The issue was also under consideration at the meeting of the Agriculture and Fisheries Council yesterday.

The issues that I have highlighted are just a sample of the work that the Presidency has led over the past seven weeks in nine Council meetings, five informal Council meetings, many other high level meetings and countless working groups, which are being led and chaired by senior Irish officials in Brussels and some of them in Dublin. All of the meetings that the Presidency chairs now have one thing in common - to make progress and to drive forward the agenda.

On a personal level, I invited my counterparts from other member states to an informal ministerial meeting - obviously European Affairs Ministers - to focus on the question which is the fourth strand of the so-called EMU process. I fear the fourth strand can be overlooked. I am referring to democratic legitimacy and accountability in the European Union. I do not need to remind the House of the importance of the topic as we move towards closer integration at EU level in response to the crisis. Everything that we do must be underpinned by a consciousness and willingness to enhance and support democratic legitimacy and accountability.

I welcome the engagement of the Oireachtas on these issues. I welcome, in particular, the parliamentary dimension of our Presidency which contributes in no small way to the democratic process in the Union. I know that the House has already had the COSAC chairpersons meeting because I attended part of it. Yesterday, the chairs of the finance committees of the EU member states and the European Parliament met in Dublin yesterday. I also took the opportunity provided by the informal meeting of European Affairs ministers to invite to Dublin my counterparts from the EU candidate countries and also from the potential candidates of the western Balkans. Ireland has always made clear its belief in the role of the enlargement process for securing peace, stability and prosperity in Europe. We remain firmly supportive of the enlargement process. As Minister of State with responsibility for European Affairs, I am pleased to have the honour of dealing with all of the candidate countries and working on the enlargement file which is important. We must remain focussed on it even though we have our internal concerns in the European Union at present.

I continue to meet my counterparts at bilateral level at EU meetings and in other EU capitals. I am the Council's main representative at debates at plenary sessions of the European Parliament in Strasbourg and we have had two very busy sessions in January and February. My practice of coming here and debating in the Seanad has stood me in good stead because at my last session in Strasbourg I had 20 hours of plenary debate which was intensive and stimulating. It was also a great opportunity for Ireland, during its Presidency, to lead the debates.

It is clear that since the introduction of the Lisbon treaty, one of the key roles of the Presidency is to represent the Council at the European Parliament and to negotiate on its behalf in order to reach compromise on the legislative agenda.

Senators will be aware that since the Lisbon treaty, almost every policy area is now dealt with by way of co-decision. That means that, as important as Ministers may think they are, they are no more important than members of the European Parliament with whom we have a two-track process. It is crucial that the Irish EU Presidency works constructively and fruitfully with the European Parliament in order to progress, otherwise we would meet roadblocks along the way. It is important for us to have that strong working relationship in order to progress our priorities. More often than not, I am fortunate to be in the hot seat in dealing with the European Parliament on behalf of the Presidency.

I would like to outline some of the key tasks and challenges that face the Irish Presidency over the coming months. I have mentioned that securing agreement on the multi-annual financial framework, MFF, with the European Parliament will be one of the major challenges facing the Presidency. It is new territory because we have not had this task in the past. It is a real challenge for us and one that we cannot take for granted, yet I am confident of a successful outcome.

In parallel, we will also be focusing on reform of the Common Agricultural Policy, CAP, the Common Fisheries Policy, CFP, Horizon 2020 and the Structural Fund. Most crucially, the Presidency will also push for agreement on banking union proposals to ensure the commitments made last June will be delivered upon. In addition to working to advance the Single Market and digital economy proposals identified to drive growth, the Presidency will also work intensively to secure a Council mandate for EU-US trade negotiations. I referred to these earlier.

We look forward to making good progress on these issues as we face into the remaining four months of our Presidency. I would like to thank this House once again for its support to date. I hope that I will have an opportunity to return here later in the Presidency - maybe at the two thirds stage - with more positive news on our Presidency objectives and the progress we are making. I hope that when I return at the end of our Presidency, all Senators will be able to agree with me that we have had a successful Presidency. It will have helped to elevate Ireland's standing, not just in a European context but also globally. The Irish EU Presidency will genuinely deliver positive steps towards growth and job creation for the whole of the European Union and particularly for our own citizens here in Ireland.