This motion is being discussed with Motion No. 5 relating to the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth and Ninth Reports.
Developments in the European Communities—Tenth Report: Motion (Resumed).
Debate resumed on the following motion:
That Dáil Éireann takes note of the Report: Developments in the European Communities—Tenth Report.
—(Minister for Foreign Affairs.)
I would be tempted to allow the House to pass these motions now because what we are doing is debating history.
I agree.
We are proposing to debate what is going on now in the Community and I take this opportunity to ask the Minister to use his good offices to get the Joint Committee on Secondary Legislation of the European Communities working again. The Dáil was re-elected five months ago but the committee have not met since May, six months ago.
Would the Deputy like me to bring him up to date on the position?
I do not know what may have happened.
There is no point in talking in terms of the last Dáil. As the Deputy will know, the committee could not have been reconvened until the Seanad had met. Therefore, the relevant date is that on which the Seanad was elected. That is not six months ago. I can assure the Deputy that it will not be any longer than days before the scandal he has been talking will have been rectified.
I am not apportioning blame to either side but it is a scandal that this Parliament cannot regulate its business in a better way. Whatever the cause, this should not be allowed to continue to happen, whether it requires an amendment of the Standing Orders of both Houses or a rectification of a weakness in the law. It is scandalous that alone among the European countries Ireland depends on the frequency of elections— the average is three-and-a-half years— and that between elections we find ourselves impotent in regard to such matters for six months. During those periods we are unable to make any contribution towards the drafting of fundamental EEC laws. It is not good enough.
That may be so, but it does not all derive from here. Nothing could have been done until the Seanad had been re-elected.
We might refer it to the Committee on Procedure and Privileges.
Did the Minister say the Committee would be re-activated with the next three of four days?
The two Houses are involved.
The Seanad have met several times. To use a crude expression, it is not bloody well good enough that we do not order our affairs in a better way. We must make sure that the same thing does not happen again. We appointed a Committee on the semi-State bodies and they, too, have lost six months during which they could have been looking at the affairs of CIE and so on. It is no use our trying to help to look after the affairs of other countries when we cannot put our own house in order.
On the EEC Committee we have a hard-working Secretariat but all they have been able to do since May has been to collect and file documents. Members of either House have access to that documentation because the Secretariat have been good enough to keep it in order, but we have not been able to have an adequate debate on these matters. While we are discussing the EEC it would have been remiss of me if I had not raised this topic.
This does not apply only to the EEC Committee.
We cannot accept the demand made by some members of the EEC that Ireland's contribution to the EEC budget should be very significantly increased next year and we on this side totally support the Government's rejection of the efforts to require from Ireland, the poorest member, a significantly increased contribution. The country should be aware of the reasons for this demand, the prime one being that the member countries who are making the principal contribution were astounded at the irresponsibility of the Fianna Fáil Party who, in order to win an election, promised to wipe out revenue of more than £100 million at a time when this country was borrowing £300 million through the good offices of the EEC.
That is not true.
I was a member of the Finance Council of Europe and I heard my colleagues——
I have been negotiating with them since and not one of them has made that point.
There was condemnation of such irresponsibility——
Does the Deputy accept what I have said, on my honour?
The Minister should keep his cool.
Can the Minister at this stage give us an indication of when the debate will be resumed?
Very soon. I can tell Deputies that the Committee will be meeting more regularly than previously.
Debate adjourned.