Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, is very welcome. I begin by acknowledging that this summit does represent something very significant. As someone said earlier, it is the first one in 18 years. It represents a real triumph for both Ireland and Iceland in particular. The way both governments have worked really positively must be acknowledged today. It is very important that the summit is taking place.

I pay tribute in particular to Senator O’Loughlin, who has worked very diligently and played a leading role in regard to this. That must be acknowledged.I also recognise the rest of the PACE team, in particular Senator Joe O'Reilly, who has been on the team for about 15 years at this point. He has been a consistently strong performer. It is important to acknowledge his work in particular but the work of all of the team in recent years.

I want to make a few points in the short time I have. The first and most obvious one is that when these governments come together for the summit, they must address the vital lack of resources. It is absolutely shocking that right now the total budget for the Council of Europe is equivalent to one day’s budget in the European Union. That is the level of underspend and underinvestment in our human rights bodies. That is shocking. It is something that has been called out as well by the Irish Council of Civil Liberties, which drew my attention to the Hague Civil Society Declaration on Council of Europe reform. I hope the Government has paid attention to this document, which has ten very clear points and I do not think any of us would disagree with any of them. They relate to strengthening the Council of Europe and its resources, and working on the implementation of judgments. We have a massive problem in the Council of Europe. The amount of unimplemented judgments increased by 1,000 in the past two years. It is the same small set of countries that are responsible in the main for those. I know there are proposals here for political dialogue to try to deal with that, which is very welcome, but we must make sure the resources are in place. I hope the Government will take a particularly strong lead in that regard.

The second point is one of fundamental importance. I refer to the call in Senator O'Loughlin's report for the whole assembly to unanimously adopt new environmental rights. It is essential to take the lead and for the Council of Europe to establish environmental protection as a right while redirecting the commitment to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to limit the global temperature in line with the Paris Agreement and to guarantee the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment in line with assembly resolution 2396 of 2022. The Minister of State referred to this in his speech. I do not suggest he does not back this, but Senator O’Loughlin made a very clear call in her speech that every government would get behind it. I hope the Minister of State can provide simple clarity that the Government will fully support the call for the new environmental rights to be incorporated into the Council of Europe. That is essential. I do not think future generations would ever forgive us if we did not take that tack and take a really strong line on it.

Third, there is a very important recommendation on ensuring the European Union accession to the European Convention on Human Rights. Right now, European institutions are not accountable to the European Court of Human Rights. That is a fundamental problem. We know how that problem is manifesting itself at the moment. We have the pushing back of human beings right across a whole host of countries in Europe, and mass drownings continuing in the Mediterranean Sea. It is unacceptable. Unfortunately, we know the EU institutions-----