Ms Marian Harkin:

I thank the House for the kind invitation to speak here this morning. It really is an honour and one I appreciate. Many of my colleagues have been here this week and other weeks. The first thing I noticed when I entered the House was that it is really up close and personal; one gets to eyeball people here. It is obviously a good Chamber for debating. There is no such thing as avoiding anybody's eyes here; if one says something, one must mean it. I really appreciate this honour. It is more than just an opportunity to have a nice polite conversation and exchange views. We have an opportunity to make a connection and to deliver better outcomes for EU citizens, including Irish citizens. I will return to this. I am not talking about an exchange of views alone; in EU parlance, I am speaking about enhanced co-operation that will result in real and meaningful engagement between this House and the EU institutions. This is very important. It is largely, but not entirely, a neglected area. This House could play a significantly enhanced and vital role. I will return to this because it is the core message I want to deliver today, particularly in the context of plans to abolish the Seanad. From the very start, I have opposed the plan to abolish it. I will do so consistently, for a number of reasons.

Let me give a very brief outline of my work. I will mention a number of headline issues. If Senators are interested, they may ask questions. I will also speak briefly about the current issues that are important to Ireland in the negotiations. Having had the privilege to serve in Dáil Éireann as an Independent Member, I am in a position to outline the differences between how we operate at European and national levels. Sometimes, when I am asked the difference between the European Parliament and Irish Parliament, I answer in just one sentence: of all the money that is spent at EU level, just one cent in every euro is spent by the European institutions. Some 99 cent out of every euro, or 99% of all money spent, is spent by the member states. This implies that issues that affect people daily, including the disability allowance, the old age pension, the location of a road or hospital, and judges' or teachers' pay, are dealt with at national level. At EU level, our role is mainly concerned with legislation. Many Irish people think of money when they think of Europe. They think of funding but, in truth, only 1% of all money spent is spent at EU level. Increasingly, EU legislation is having an impact on people's lives. It is much more significant than many people realise.

At EU level, the system is quite different. We do not have a government and an opposition. No single group has overall control, and therefore we must negotiate. We must work with one another to reach compromises in order to achieve agreement and to pass legislation. This is good in many ways because it allows individual MEPs, especially members of the larger groups, to influence what goes on and to make a difference.

Senators will have heard of the groups in the Parliament. The largest is the European People’s Party, of which Fine Gael is a member. There are also the Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, of which the Labour Party is a member, and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, the third largest group. My Fianna Fáil colleagues and I are members of that. There are also the Greens–European Free Alliance and the European United Left–Nordic Green Left. Sinn Féin and Paul Murphy are members of the latter. Individual MEPs can influence outcomes in a way that I did not find possible in Dáil Éireann. That is one of the significant differences.

One of the main positive aspects of our ratification of the Lisbon treaty, and my main reason for asking people to vote "Yes" to it, is that we now have co-decision-making powers in the Parliament. Members are democratically elected and accountable. We are very busy at present in the area of co-decision-making under the Irish Presidency in that we are trying to reach agreement on some of the big-ticket items, including the Common Agricultural Policy, social and regional policy and the Common Fisheries Policy. As an Independent, I contend the Irish Presidency is proceeding very well. There is a considerable amount of work for politicians and civil servants in trying to obtain agreement on many of the really difficult issues. Ireland has and always has had a good reputation for being hard-working, pragmatic and willing to seek agreement on various issues.

This may not seem very important to Irish people, because there is sometimes a sense that what is occurring in Europe does not have a huge impact on our lives. It does, however, and I will return to this point time and again. At present, people are trying to get through one day at a time, but if we do not reach agreement on the CAP or CFP proposals, for example, it will have a great impact on very many people. The same applies to the social fund. We have just concluded negotiations on the electromagnetic fields directive. I was the shadow for my group. Had we not achieved agreement on the matter, MRI scans could no longer have continued in all our hospitals from October of this year. That matters to people's lives. Under the Irish Presidency, we have just managed to achieve agreement on this. It comes under the area of workers' health and safety.

As an MEP who is not in a party, I acknowledge there is a lot of hard work taking place. I am not saying this to give people a pat on the back or because there are people from different parties in this Chamber today. There is a major effort being made. We expect it from our politicians but our civil servants give 100%. The work matters and actually does have an impact on people's lives in a way they could not even imagine.

A point of which people might not be aware and which my colleagues might not have made to date is that Irish MEPs often co-operate. It is not exactly a case of donning the green jersey, as the famous phrase goes, although it can happen at times. It is a much wider arrangement. My colleague Mr. Pat the Cope Gallagher was here last week. He is an expert on fisheries. If I need to know something about the finer detail associated with fisheries, I ask Pat. Equally, if he needs to know something on employment, he will approach a colleague. Former MEP Alan Kelly, now a Minister of State, was an expert on IT. If I needed to know anything about that or legislation thereon, I could always telephone him. Mr. Gay Mitchell is an expert on development. I could keep going down the line. It is important that people know we work together. When an issue arises that affects Ireland Inc., be it the regional aid guidelines or the common consolidated corporate tax base, we work together as a team of MEPs. Perhaps this is not fully recognised.

Where my work is concerned, I will just give a few headlines. If Senators are interested, I will answer any questions they might have.

My main committee deals with employment and social affairs and I am a substitute on the agriculture committee and the petitions committee. I am rapporteur in the employment and social affairs committee, which means I lead for the Parliament on the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund. Some Members will be familiar with that. The workers in Dell, SR Technics, Waterford Crystal and the construction workers all managed to get some assistance from that fund.

I am also shadowing for my group, which means I lead for my group in a number of areas. I will mention them and if Members wish to ask questions, that is fine. One is food aid for the deprived. In fact, one of our colleagues, Emer Costello, is the rapporteur and is leading for the Parliament on that. I will make a small point which I believe is indicative of wider and bigger things and, in a way, even reflects some of what our President was speaking about both in the Parliament and in today's newspapers. In the food aid for the deprived, which I need not explain as Members know what it means, and the globalisation fund, which helps workers who have been made redundant to get retrained, set up their own business and so forth, there is a blocking minority in the Council. That blocking minority is Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, the UK and one or two other countries. That is a significant point. They are what I might call the "hawks" in the fiscal debate. When it comes to issues such as food aid for the deprived or the globalisation fund to help redundant workers, it says a great deal that those countries, or some of them, are part of the blocking minority. If any Member wishes to raise that issue, we can return to it later.

I shadow for my group on the programme for social change and innovation. One area there that will be of interest to Members is microfinance. I am also shadowing for my committee on the proposal from Viviane Reding that there be a 40% presence of the under-represented sex, women, among the non-executive directors on boards for listed companies. I am shadowing opinions on a report on the impact of care for vulnerable people during the crisis, on a report on pensions rights and on the European semester. Finally, I am shadowing a report on medical devices, which I will mention presently because it is of crucial importance to Ireland. That is in the area of employment.

With regard to agriculture, I will not go into any detail other than to say that some Members will have a specific interest in the different facets of the Common Agricultural Policy, CAP, whether it is convergence, greening, milk quotas, coupling or whatever. Again, if they wish to discuss it or if they have any questions on it, I will be happy to deal with them. I will make one point under the heading of rural development relating to the Leader programme. In my view there is an absolute necessity to ensure that the community-led local development, CLLD, model remains in place. Ireland has had it for the last 20 years and it has been judged by the Commission and the Court of Auditors to be the best model. I will be happy to discuss that with Members also. As an aside, but also related to agriculture, yesterday there was a decision by the European Commission to ban the use of neonicotinoids for two years. It is a type of pesticide that can damage bees. It does not kill bees directly but they cannot make their way back to their hives. Of course, if there are no bees there will be no pollination, and that would be a problem for European agriculture and, indeed, for all of us.

I am also a member of the petitions committee. Ordinary individuals or groups of individuals can petition the committee in cases where a European legislative measure either has not been properly implemented or it has not been implemented at all. The petition must concern European legislation. There are a number of Irish petitions with the committee at present concerning fluoridation of water, health food claims, West=On=Track, Cappagh Farmers Support Group on Aughinish Alumina, and some from a group of people in Bray regarding building on flood plains and the environmental impact assessment directive.

Before discussing the role of the Seanad, I will mention other important legislative measures that will have an impact on Ireland. The medical devices directive is hugely important both for patients and the Irish medical devices industry. There is also the professional qualifications directive and the audit directive. I will not go into further detail on them.

The core message I wish to give today is that I believe the Seanad can play a far more meaningful role and, I believe, a crucial role in the area of European legislation. I realise there is a European affairs committee; I was a member of it for five years. However, the remit is broader than that and Senators should be fully involved at national level in all stages of European legislation, from scrutiny, which Members are aware of, through to transposition and implementation. That demands very significant resources, both in terms of time and expertise. Members of the European affairs committee are all Deputies. They are busy with their legislative work and constituency work. I genuinely believe the time and resources that are required to deal with all aspects of European legislation go beyond the time and resources available to that committee. I believe another body is required and the Seanad can be that body. One of its core functions could be overseeing all aspects of European legislation.

I do not support abolition of the Seanad. I support restructuring and a change in how the Seanad is elected, but that is an issue for another day. I wish to tease out the potential it has in the area of European legislation. Estimates vary but between 50% and 70% of all the legislation on the Statute Book comes from Europe. That percentage is increasing. When I say that, it sounds as if somebody simply sends an envelope to this country. It is important to point out that the process at European level involves the European Parliament, which is elected, the Council of Ministers, who are also elected, and the European Commission. Nevertheless, a huge amount of our legislation originates in the EU.

In the initial stages, long before legislation is written, there is a real opportunity for different bodies to influence the Commission, and the Seanad could have that role. There is a process in that regard and we do not make sufficient use of it. When the documents are written, they are scrutinised. Every national parliament has an opportunity to scrutinise the legislation. I see an increasing number of reasoned opinions coming from different member states and governments. One of them that does really excellent work is the House of Lords in England. The House of Lords has dedicated committees for the various areas, and one can see their effect. The scrutiny is related to what is called proportionality and subsidiarity. I believe there is a real opportunity in this area, but one cannot do it on a wing and a prayer. One needs time, resources and expertise.

The scrutiny is only part of the story. The legislation then goes to the European Parliament and the Council where it is amended and goes through the process. If there is agreement, and on most occasions there is, we have legislation for different member states. There are different forms of legislation, such as regulation, directive and so forth. The vast majority of European legislation is in the form of a directive. There is flexibility within the directive. A directive is supposed to achieve certain objectives, but there is flexibility for member states as to how they go about achieving those objectives. One cannot have a one-size-fits-all measure for all 27 member states. This is where I believe the Seanad can play a significant role too. Many legislative measures are debated in this House, but many also go through by statutory instrument. The main reason for the flexibility in a directive is to allow member states to adapt the legislation to their specific circumstances.

I do not believe we make the most of our opportunities here. I can think of many examples in which, if this House had been in collaboration with the civil servants, etc., who were drawing up the statutory instruments and if it had been more hands-on, we would have had fewer problems. I will throw out some examples and Senators can comment on them later. I believe the habitats directive was badly handled. If we had a body dedicated to the transposition of that legislation it would have been better, because it could not have been worse. Let us consider the wastewater directive. We saw what happened with the septic tank issue. Would we have had that debacle, for example, if this House had been involved with Cavan County Council, which managed to get it right? Let us consider all the money we have spent - I have tabled a question to the Minister on the matter but I am still waiting for an answer - in all the years defending all the cases in the European Court of Justice. I am not referring to fines and so on but solely to the amount of money we have spent. Let us consider the nitrates directive. That caused terrible trouble for two years. I wonder whether that would have happened if this House had been involved in the transposition. I offer one final example, something one would never have thought of, which I came across recently. It is as boring as the co-ordination of member states in the case of self-employed commercial agents. I will not go into the detail but I came across some people who had been agents and who were literally dropped overnight. When we went through the legislation to see what protection was in place to help them we found that article 17 of the legislation in question stated that commercial agents were entitled to either indemnity or compensation for damage. In other words, the member state made the choice. If we had made the decision that these people could have the choice of being indemnified it would have made all the difference to those who lost their businesses unfairly and unjustly overnight. This occurred some years ago but whatever the decision taken at the time, it was decided that we would not take that route and we would only look at compensation for damage, which was of far less benefit to those involved. If the matter had been debated in this House and all of the aspects had been considered we might have made a different decision in that case. There are many such examples.

That is the issue of transposition, but there is also the matter of implementation of the legislation. If we had a dedicated body to oversee the implementation of legislation we could get rid of many of the problems we experience. One thing we sometimes do in this country is over-implement and gold-plate. I wonder whether we would have a more pragmatic response if we had a body examining these issues.

In this context and in the wider context of Irish legislation, I believe the Seanad should manage a petitions committee. I have referred to the petitions committee in the European Parliament. Something similar could be of benefit, or perhaps a citizens' initiative that would allow people to initiate legislation. Why not have both a petitions committee and a citizens' initiative? Often I hear about the democratic deficit and the gap between citizens and the European Union, and that is true despite the best efforts of MEPs, the Commission, the European Parliament and so on. However, if a core function of this House was to oversee European legislation in all its phases then I believe citizens would have another link to the European Union, on a statutory footing, which could be resourced and have expertise available at the service of citizens.

We all know the drill: if there is good news the Minister, whoever he or she is, claims it - we all tend do this as politicians - but if it is bad news then Europe is to blame. The gap that exists between Irish citizens and the European Union is widening and people are becoming more alienated. The issue is bigger than the Seanad. It is about enhancing representative and participative democracy. I have referred to the petitions committee and the citizens' initiative already in this regard. There is a black hole and a huge gap between citizens and the European Union and I believe a restructured Seanad could help to re-establish those connections and ensure fairer and better outcomes for ordinary people. That would give added legitimacy to this House and to its functioning.