2026-05-07

I am grateful to the Deputies who contributed to this important annual debate. We take time in the busy Dáil schedule every year ahead of Europe Day, on 9 May, to reflect on contemporary historical and future issues facing the European Union and the wider European project. I will address three points in the Chamber today. I will go into a little bit of detail about our upcoming Presidency of the rotating Council of the European Union, respond to some of the points made by some of the Deputies, and reflect on where the European Union is going and where the debate that we have can impact that. In relation to the upcoming Presidency, the exact detail of our policy priority areas will be laid out in the coming weeks by the Taoiseach and the Minister, Deputy McEntee, as is appropriate. Certainly, one issue that will dominate the Presidency, even though the conclusion will not be reached until afterwards, is the negotiation of the European budget for the next seven years, also known as the multi-annual financial framework. Bearing in mind that I am Minister of State with responsibility for international development, I emphasise that a key part of that is the Global Europe debate, which is of massive concern, most importantly due to the real, clear backsliding by so many countries across the world when it comes to support for humanitarian activities, for the international development infrastructure and for multilateralism. The United States, through the United States Agency for International Development, USAID, was once responsible for over 25% of global development, that was abolished overnight. As a result, Europe is now by far the largest player, both as the European Union but also on a member state basis. Ireland was one of two EU member states to increase its development budget last year. I hope and look forward to the ability to do that again next year. In the face of cuts by a number of EU member states which have been traditionally viewed as strong donors, we need to see that level of protection from the European Union in budgetary purpose for development and humanitarian activity. When you remove funding from development programmes and remove support from humanitarianism, you merely fuel the issues that fall at our doorsteps and into our constituency clinics on a daily basis. This matters. It matters to everyone in our country. It is not some object at a remove. When you remove development support from communities and when you turn your back on allowing humanitarian actors to get support into the most dire situations around the world, you simply provide fodder for the sorts of movements that lead to political extremism; force people into forced migration, which in turn leads to irregular mass migration across the continent of Africa and other parts of the world; lead to extreme hardship for those most at risk from the impact of the climate emergency; lead to food insecurity; and lead to energy security. All of this has a massive consequence for the people of Europe. In that further regard, and in the context of the second part of my own brief, I would like to look at the impact of the work of the European Union on the Irish diaspora. Close to 150,000 Irish people live in other EU member states. They are absolutely free to live, work and study in those countries. They can make sure they can play a full part under the four freedoms of the European movement. Last year, we welcomed over 26,000 EU citizens to live, work and study in this country. They continue to contribute warmly. I want to pick up a few points that were made during this afternoon's debate. I was quite taken by Deputies Bennett and Cronin, who spoke in vicious tones about the European project. They laid out their criticism of the project in many areas and at the same time, in parallel, said it is okay to be questioning or critical of the European project. Deputy Aird said the same, and he is dead right. At some stage, hiding behind the veneer of somehow being a questioning authority becomes quite revealing because they are speaking on behalf of a party that has opposed every European referendum and has consistently opposed European efforts. It deliberately used the term "No to an EU army" during European election debates even though there was no proposal for an EU army. People talk about it, but there is no official proposal. There is no Irish support for it, whether people want to believe that or not. The facts matter. I am delighted my friend Deputy Boyd Barrett - I do mean that - returned to the Chamber. We have debated this for as long as we have known each other and it is good, healthy debate. The Deputy's vision of Europe differs from mine, and that is good. However, I suggest that when talking about a genocide happening in the Middle East - I agree with the Deputy on that matter - it is unfair not to refer at all to the absolute horrors that are happening in Ukraine, which were not cited in the Deputy's interventions or those of his party colleague, Deputy Murphy. When the Deputy spoke about armaments and security, it is unfortunate that he did not reference the biggest conflict happening on European soil since the Second World War. The Deputy has addressed that in other debates, and I agree with him that no one wins from this war, but the Deputy cannot approach it in such an à la carte measure when we are trying to combine a debate. A couple of other points that were made are of real relevance to our Presidency and deserve response. First, I will respond to Deputy Timmins's point about the Draghi report. I sat around the Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council when we discussed this at length. When we look at the three key policy priorities for the Presidency - values, security and competitiveness - the full implementation of the Draghi report, and the response and respect for an EU of equal 27 member states, is so key. Deputy Aird said at length that, taken as a whole, the European Union has been beneficial for Ireland. Any independent analysis can say that the Ireland of today is fundamentally better in every scoring matrix than the Ireland of 1972. When certain Members who sit in certain corners of the Chamber - certainly, not those present in the Chamber - talk about a return to the good old days in a way that mirrors the sort of discussion we have seen far too often in Britain and in parts of the United States, I question what part of the good old days they are looking for. Are they looking for a return to an average lifespan of 62 or the reintroduction of the marriage bar? Are they speaking about a time when there was an absolute inability for people to achieve greater educational obtainment? If so, they want a poorer, backwards Ireland. Deputy Aird makes the key point that food security is one of the key components of the European project. The Common Agricultural Policy was set up in the 1960s to make sure that Europe could always be able to feed itself. We have to make sure that food security, not only within Europe but within our partner countries, is a key part. Deputy Heneghan referred at length to energy security. He proposed a number of areas where progress could be made more quickly. People have had debates over the last number of days, in this Chamber and in the media, in relation to the possibility of nuclear energy. They are all valid arguments and I have no issue with them, but we have to look at how Europe secures its energy better. Europe secured its food coming out of the 1960s, coming out of the era of rationing and great starvation. We now need to secure our energy because our overdependence on outside actors is clearly telling, and is clearly felt in every homestead across the country as well as in every business. I would like to comment on some of the tone and some of the rhetoric used consistently in the debate. Some of it is misplaced. I agreed fundamentally with Deputy Ó Murchú when he spoke eloquently about his belief, unlike what we heard from other members of his party in their contributions, that the EU peace project has worked. The Deputy suggested that during Brexit, France and Germany somehow wanted to change the negotiations because of their export strategy. Now this matters. I have a lot of time for Deputy Ó Murchú, and he knows that, but when he says that he is placing a piece of misinformation on the record of the Dáil. We all remember a campaign by various right-wing economic think tanks in the United Kingdom and newspapers in that country, such as the Daily Express, the Daily Mail and The Daily Telegraph. The Ceann Comhairle played an important role during the Brexit debates in her professional career. We all remember the consistent misinformation that the EU was going to buckle at any moment and that Europe was going to throw Ireland under the bus. Ultimately, that never happened. There was no such proposal from the German or French Governments because we saw that level of tolerance. Yesterday, European Movement Ireland, an organisation that I used work with for quite some time professionally as well as still being a member of, produced its annual report, which has been referenced by most speakers in the Chamber. It showed that 82% of Irish people want Ireland to remain within the European Union - the exact same as it was last year. It is not the heady 93% of the peak Brexit years, and that is what we are all talking about, but it is still well ahead of the years when this report started when we were talking about the troika coming to Ireland and the fiscal stability treaty, etc. That 82% level matters. When you dig into the figures, however, you can see that people are worried about the direction in which the European Union is going. We have to reflect on how we talk about Europe in this Chamber. We have a debate every year. I share some of Deputy Murphy's cynicism, perhaps from a different angle, about this set-piece debate. How many times have we got up to blame Brussels for something? How many times have we used the European project as a handy scapegoat? British commentators will tell you that when politicians spent 40 years blaming Brussels for everything that was inconvenient in their lives and then spent six weeks trying to convince people to remain within the EU, the debate was lost. The UK's people and economy have been suffering desperately ever since. I am very grateful to the Oireachtas for putting together its programme of Europe Day events. I am very grateful to the Blue Star programme that is running in schools around our country. If we are going to debate Europe, just as we debate other tricky issues in this Chamber, let us do it from a basis of fact and with language and rhetoric that are reflective of good tolerant debate. Go raibh maith agat, a Cheann Comhairle, and happy Europe Day.

You too.