Seanad debates

Wednesday, 5 October 2016

Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement: Motion

 

10:30 am

Photo of Neale RichmondNeale Richmond (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

There you go - more five-year-old behaviour. Half of the conspiracy theories dreamt up are done so because nobody is prepared to stick up for the other side of the argument. I am issuing a challenge to the Government, the leaders in Europe, business leaders, farm leaders and the vast majority of people this deal will benefit to get out there and tackle the naysayers and the misinformation.

A couple of issues have come into this. The motion says that this is a huge attack on local government. I note that the five initial signatories never sat on local government, something I had the privilege of doing for seven years with Senator Horkan in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council and at European level on the European Committee of the Regions where I had the honour of leading the Irish delegation.We discussed this and we saw that the impact on local and regional authorities and government throughout the European Union of trade deals such as CETA, TTIP and the South Korean deal that is the model for best practice have an overwhelmingly positive effect. Just because motions were passed by just two local authorities in the Republic, in Clare and in Dublin city, we are meant to take at face value the statement that this is negative to local government or local authorities. It is not.

I decided to engage on this matter. During the week I attended the briefing by Congress. I apologise that I was not able to make Senator Higgins's briefing, but it was purely a life administration issue rather than any boycott. At the briefing by Congress, someone asked me would I not have the decency to put CETA to a referendum. This whole notion of direct democracy and that we throw everything to a referendum is absolute rubbish because, at the end of the day, if CETA is put to a referendum, we know we will not be discussing CETA; it would be a referendum on mad ideas like abortion on demand and conscription into a European army. We have seen that too many times, so I disagree fundamentally that CETA should go to a referendum. Neither the Social Welfare Bill nor the Finance Bill goes to a referendum.

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