European Union Treaty: Statements.

The Taoiseach

Today, Dáil Éireann has the opportunity to explain clearly and simply to the Irish people the main issues when they vote next week on 18 June on ratification of the European Union Treaty, and why they should not be influenced by the decision of the Danish people.

All the main parties in this House, and the vast majority of organisations outside, especially the trade unions, the employers and the farmers, share my conviction that there is an enormous amount at stake for this country. We are all advocating what we believe in good faith to be in the best interests of the Irish people, and it is hardly credible to suggest that we are all intent on deceiving the people. Irish politicians are closer to the people than is the case in any other country. This is a major decision, which should not be taken lightly, or on the basis of concerns about one issue, however important. The decision should be based on a judgment on the broad balance of advantage, and on a clear view of where Ireland's future lies.

I am concerned that voters should have the fullest possible information on all the issues. With the end to the postal strike, the Government's short guide should be in the hands of all voters, including those in the Dublin area, in the next day or two at the latest. A number of supplementary leaflets covering the Treaty and its benefits have also been produced. I would also like to announce that as and from Thursday a special free telephone information line will be established to answer any queries which voters may have. Details will be advertised. There has also been very full information provided in the media, and in that regard I would like to pay tribute to the print media for their full coverage, and especially to RTE on their decision to broadcast the next two hours of Dáil proceedings, as a means of bringing information direct to the listening public.

The decision here on 18 June is vitally important, not just for Ireland, but for the whole of Europe. We are being asked to decide whether European Union should go ahead. We have a right and a duty as a sovereign, independent country to give our own answer to that. There can be no question of our position, or our right to decide, being pre-empted or taken away from us by the Danes. The Irish as a sovereign people have their own right to speak. Danish concerns have always been very different from ours. They have the highest per capita income in the Community. Geographically, they are much more centrally placed. They will be net contributors to the EC budget. Like Britain, but unlike Ireland, they have for their own reasons never been keen supporters of close European integration.

We are proceeding with the referendum to ratify, because each member state under the Treaty has agreed to complete the procedure before the end of the year, and we are therefore legally obliged to do so. The Foreign Ministers of the Twelve meeting in Oslo, including the Danish Foreign Minister, all agreed that ratification by each member state should go ahead as planned. We cannot presume what the situation will be, until the ratification procedure is complete in all countries. As things stand, the Treaty remains open for ratification by all who have signed the Treaty till the end of the year and even beyond. What would happen, if one or more member states finally and definitively refuse to ratify the European Union Treaty, with the other member states still willing and, indeed, determined to go ahead, is a matter that may have to be addressed, if and when the time comes. The Danish Foreign Minister has not looked for a renegotiation and has clearly expressed a desire that the rest of the Community should go ahead with European Union with or without Denmark. Ireland has no wish to exclude anyone. We would like Denmark to be full participants in European Union, to the extent that they themselves wish, bearing in mind the need for a workable legal and institutional framework.

The decision to ratify is in the first instance a political choice. In proceeding with the referendum on 18 June, we are asking the Irish people to make this political choice. Making the choice, whether we wish to be part of the European Union on the basis of the Treaty, retains its full political validity, regardless of the Danish decision. Our choice could have very important consequences, if at the end of the day some alternative to the European Union Treaty, even if only as to the number of participants, has to be found. It will indicate whether Ireland does or does not want to be part of a group of countries committed to further European integration.

It is untrue that the Community's reaction to the Danish decision shows a willingness to override small nations that would not be displayed towards a larger one. If the Community is to maintain momentum, it has to be able to find a way to proceed, even when one or more member states choose to opt out, and they are not always the smaller ones. The Social Charter and the EMS were proceeded with, despite the non-participation of Britain, which also has an opt-out clause in relation to European Monetary Union. President Mitterrand, when he argues against French isolation in Europe, is not counting on any special treatment for France, if it votes "No".

Our experience in the Community, on the contrary, is that small countries are shown every consideration. The best way to enhance our sovereignty in an interdependent world is to belong to a body like the European Community, which gives us a chance to influence and shape decisions often out of proportion to our numerical weight in terms of population. How often have specific Irish interests been protected by a special clause, an exemption, a declaration?

Proinsias De Rossa

Or a Protocol?

The Taoiseach

In the recent Common Agricultural Policy reform deal, for instance, we obtained a special measure, to assist the production of winter beef, unique to Ireland. The alternative to full participation, to a seat at the table, is to be a spectator on the outside without any influence looking in. The EFTA countries have found that unsatisfactory. Under the principle of subsidiarity most decisions will still be taken by an Irish Government in Dublin, respecting the criteria which we have accepted for European Monetary Union. Far from enhancing the power of the European Commission, the Treaty increases the role of the directly elected European Parliament and the European Council, made up of heads of government and Foreign Ministers, thus reducing the power of the bureaucrats in Brussels.

In the last 40 years Western Europe has enjoyed unprecedented peace and prosperity. The holocaust of war, acute tensions between states, great economic depressions have been banished. The founding of the European Community, a new and unique concept in international relations, can be compared in importance to the founding of the United States of America, and is the product of a similar enlightenment. The Community has not only protected the peace and stability of Western Europe, but provided a magnet and an alternative model for the peoples of Eastern Europe to break loose from foreign domination, from the dictatorship of a State system devised to suppress the individual. A dynamic Community played a part in breaking down the Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain.

In the inter-war years the absence of any such structures undermined democracy and led to terrible consequences. We can see in other parts of Europe today the dangers to peace and the potential for destruction caused by ethnic tensions and territorial rivalries that go back to the pre-1914 era. In our own island of Ireland the European Community can contribute to the framework for a settlement that will bring about peace and reconciliation, that transcends historic differences, and provides a basis for constructive co-operation, given the growing economic interdependence between the North and the South. A negative outcome would reinforce Partition.

If Ireland were to vote "No", either of two situations could arise. We could either be excluded from European Union, which would go ahead with a smaller number on a slightly different legal basis yet to be determined. Alternatively, European Union would not go ahead at all. I want to explain as simply as I can why it is in our interest that European Union goes ahead, and why Ireland should be part of it, and why the converse would be very detrimental to our national interests.

The kind of stability that the Community has given is the foundation of economic confidence and prosperity. If European Union were to be halted or rejected, it would represent a huge confidence blow to the whole Community. Ireland would no longer be so attractive a place for investment. The Community would at best be condemned to stagnate and at worst it would begin to break up.

European Union is the next logical step after joining the Community, and the completion of the Single Market. To operate effectively the Single Market needs a single currency, which requires the pursuit of common economic policies, resulting in convergence through cohesion. You cannot run a common currency without a high degree of political solidarity, hence the need for Political Union. Everything in the Treaty hangs together. The kernel of the Treaty is the single currency. Everything else is built round it.

What are the advantages to Ireland of belonging to European Union? First of all, we have free, unhindered access to a European market of 360 million consumers, including EFTA. We are the country that is most dependent on exports. 1,000 foreign companies have established in Ireland, including some very large and important ones, in recent years. If we vote "No", a serious doubt will arise, as has already happened in Denmark, as to whether Ireland is a suitable base for supplying the European market. Will these companies remain in Ireland to supply a market of 3.5 million people?

A common currency will facilitate transactions, and it will eliminate exchange costs. It will create a stable framework of investment, and enhance confidence in our future. We will be represented on the European Central Bank, and along with other countries we will be able to exert more influence on interest rates, which are now effectively determined by Germany alone, reflecting purely domestic German considerations.

One of the most common misconceptions is that European Monetary Union involves severely deflationary policies. This is simply not the case. Ireland is eligible to participate in European Monetary Union now. We are required to make steady progress towards an eventual debt — GDP ratio of 60 per cent, which we have been successfully doing since 1987. All that is required is a continuation of current policies under sound economic management.

Consequently, there is no truth in the suggestion that severe Government cut-backs are in the offing, or that social welfare payments will have to be drastically cut. The Government have shown their good faith over many years to those on social welfare. Even in the most adverse budgetary conditions in the 1980s Fianna Fáil substantially improved in real terms the position of the old and the unemployed and their families.

Mr. Byrne

Ask Cotter and McDermott what they thought of equal rights.

The Taoiseach

When, for budgetary reasons, there had to be severe cut-backs, social welfare was spared. I want to give a categorical assurance to everyone dependent on social welfare that the Government will adhere to the commitments agreed in the Programme for Economic and Social Progress to maintain the value of social welfare payments in real terms.

A country that refused to participate in European Union would be excluded altogether from the Cohesion Fund, because this fund is strictly tied to the Maastricht Treaty. Here it is interesting to quote from an article in the business page of the London Times yesterday on the consequences of rejection of that European Union Treaty and it not proceeding as it is. The article suggests that a subgroup of countries, mainly the Benelux countries, France and Germany, would move even faster towards monetary union. I quote:

The main question for the inner monetary core of Europe would be which other countries to admit. There would also be no question of ‘cohesion funds' to transfer resources from the richer northern European countries to poorer southern ones as a reward for joining the monetary club. In fact, far from bribing new countries to join, this club's membership policy would be "strictly by invitation only".

Ireland at present enjoys very favourable financial arrangements with the Community. We receive £6 from the EC for every £1 we contribute. Community net transfers amount to 7 per cent of our gross national product. Last year, our farmers received direct into the hand £290 million in premia and subsidies. When the Common Agricultural Policy reform is fully implemented, this figure will rise to £650 million per year.

The proposal to double the funds to the poorer countries from the Commission remains on the table. Of course, these have to be negotiated. I have never suggested otherwise. The present round of Structural Funds expires in 1993, and if we vote "No", we will not even have a seat at the table for the negotiations which are now beginning. Without these funds the Community would be largely a free trade area with little to countervail the impact of the marketplace. I have to ask opponents of the Treaty do they have a vision of Europe that corresponds largely to that of the previous British Prime Minister, because that would be the most likely outcome of a collapse of the European Union Treaty.

I do not honestly believe Ireland could negotiate a better deal, even if the Treaty were open for re-negotiation. It is far more likely that we would lose more than we would gain.

Virtually every economic and social programme that we have depends on the European funding element: our infrastructure, environment, education and training, rural development, scientific research, our industry, financial services and tourism, forestry and fishing. If we want a modern public transport system in Dublin, if we want to renew our mainline railway, we will need European funds. It is no use saying we are in favour of European Union, but not in this particular form. It is not on offer to us in any other form, and certainly not on any more advantageous terms.

We have an immense unrealised potential in this country, which was highlighted in the latest ESRI report. Our economy is now balanced so as to be able to sustain a very high rate of economic growth. The ESRI stress and I quote:

that Ireland's growth potential in the context of the Single European Market and approaching monetary union is significantly greater than that of most competing economies.

They also make the point that Ireland is well placed to attract a share of increasing international investment, I again quote: "assuming, of course, that Ireland remains in the mainstream of movement towards European Economic Union".

We need above-average growth if we are to succesfully tackle the problem of unemployment. We had a glimpse of what could be achieved in 1989-90, when the economy grew by an average of 6 per cent and employment grew by nearly 40,000. The unemployed had every reason to support Ireland's participation in European Union. It provided the best hope of increased investment and jobs, and of providing the wealth needed to maintain and improve the position of the disadvantaged throughout our society.

The economic consequences of a "No" vote would be very serious. Things would not stay the same. As we have seen in Denmark, interest and mortgage rates would rise immediately. To the extent that German investors, who have a huge amount invested in Ireland, lost confidence in our ability to maintain our exchange rate, the protection of our currency could cost us even more dearly in higher interest and mortgage rates. Industrialists would put their investment decisions on hold. Weakened confidence in the economy would lead to higher unemployment. The likelihood of a serious reduction over time in EC funds transferred to Ireland could cause severe deflation, including tax rises and expenditure cuts. Many projects would have to be cancelled and deferred. The notion that nothing would change could not be further from the truth.

The European Union Treaty has a strong social dimension, that will extend and improve the rights of employers and workers. That is why it is supported not only by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions but by the European Trade Union organisations. European citizenship rights will underpin the right to free movement to take up employment or residence anywhere in the Union.

Europe has also done much to advance women's rights, promoting equality of opportunity and equal treatment in the workplace, in social security and pension rights. It has repeatedly been European-inspired decisions that much of the advance in equlity for women has derived from. I welcome the recognition of this today by the Council for the Status of Women.

The European Union does not mean abortion. The problems that have arisen must be dealt with in our own domestic law. Our European partners have no desire to become involved, under the principle of subsidiarity which is set out explicitly in a new article of the Treaty. Social and moral legislation is a question entirely for ourselves. These matters will be dealt with separately later on this year. The abortion issue has been separated, as far as most reasonable people are concerned, from the European Union Treaty. It is not relevant to next week's decision.

We will not be joining NATO or any other military alliance, following ratification of the European Union Treaty. Any new proposals that may be presented in 1996 will have to be agreed unanimously, and put to the Irish people. There is absolutely no provision for conscription to a Euro-army in the Treaty. I would like to reassure parents, and particularly mothers, that regardless of what else happens in 1996 Ireland will not agree to any arrangements that involve conscription. Britain has long been a member of both NATO and the Western European Union and abolished conscription nearly 30 years ago.

Mr. Garland

I must protest at the casual manner in which the Taoiseach is ignoring the real possibility of the introduction of conscription here.

Mr. Noonan

(Limerick East): The most important things are, in the final analysis, very simple. The Maastricht Treaty with all its complexities and detail has confused many people. Its ramifications are far reaching and in so far as economic and monetary union are concerned, an acquaintance with the principles of monetary economics is necessary, to come to an understanding of the concepts involved.

The decision is, however, simple. The Maastricht Treaty, if passed, will provide us all with new opportunities: opportunities for greater economic growth, for higher living standards, for jobs for our neighbours, our families and our friends, for greater choices and for more elbow room in our personal lives and opportunities for greater freedom in a Europe with a diversity of cultures and ways of life. A "Yes" vote is a vote to take these opportunities. A "No" vote slams the door on these opportunities.

It is really quite simple: we can decide to go forward or to go backwards. If we go forward we face the future with pride and confidence, dedicating our talents to building a new Ireland in a new Europe, proud of being Irish in that new Europe. If we vote "No" we turn our backs on the future and take a conscious decision to remain in an Irish backwater, while our European neighbours proceed to decide our future without our participation.

I believe that our economy is now very well positioned to avail of the opportunities which will come once the Maastricht Treaty is passed. There is undercapacity in our economy and, at the same time, our competitive position is quite strong. The modest growth rates which we are now experiencing, could be boosted dramatically by the process of Economic and Monetary Union, and by the massive boost to confidence the ratification of the Maastricht Treaty will bring. By 1994 our growth rates could be the highest in Europe, up to and in excess of 5 per cent. This level of growth in recent years has only been achieved in the Pacific rim economies but because of the special conditions now prevailing it is possible to achieve such growth levels from 1994 to the completion of European Monetary Union.

Those are the kinds of growth rates we need if we are to make any serious impression on job creation. Sustained growth of 5 per cent for five years would create about 120,000 new jobs in Ireland. That is the kind of job creation which would make the necessary dramatic impact on our way of life. The possibility is now opening for us to do that. A "Yes" vote alone will not achieve that. The Government must also reverse the anti-business policies they introduced in the last budget. A "Yes" vote, however, will provide the confidence necessary for those growth levels and will help to reduce interest rates, a factor so crucial to growth, and the opportunities of a market of 380 million persons, all committed to the concept of a new Europe, is an opportunity that this country needs and cannot turn its back on. It is that opportunity rather than £1 million here or there in the Structural Funds which is the exciting prospect.

After 1 January 1993 citizens of all member states will be citizens of the Union. They will have all the rights of citizens of the Union but those rights will not derive simply because they are citizens of their own country but because they will have a new citizenship conferred on them, that of the European Union. These citizens will have equal rights under the law. Principal among the rights will be the right to travel, the right to work and the right to set up a home or a business in any part of the Union.

Mr. McCartan

Except for Irish women.

Mr. Noonan

(Limerick East): Is it not a noble and exciting prospect that after 800 years of domination by our nearest neighbours and after such a short period of having the freedom to run our own affairs, we will now participate in the building of the new Europe: free and equal citizens not only of this ancient land but also of a Europe growing in confidence, influence and power? We should not underplay the importance of this aspect of the Maastricht Treaty, because this is the very key to the Treaty. During the long years of economic and political domination by Great Britain, how often did our forefathers turn to Europe for aid and refuge? Frequently our wars, which were so important to us, were mere sideshows in wider European conflicts, but the very domination by the British, “the seed of all our woes”, drove us to closer links with Europe. As missionaries, as mendicants, as soldiers of fortune and as patriotic emissaries to the great courts of Europe our forefathers went, and every generation rewove and re-established the links. The great halls of Versailles were as well known to the Irish as were the libraries of Louvain or Salamanca or the battlefields of Flanders or Passchendaele. I say this to remind ourselves that we are not participating as strangers in a European Union. The Celts, the Vikings and the Normans who settled in so much of Europe settled in Ireland too. We have a common heritage, a common cultural background with our European neighbours, and we should claim that inheritance by a very strong “Yes” vote.

At the weekend I watched the French film "Jean de Florette", and I was struck by the similarities of its theme and action with that of John B. Keane's "The Field". I was struck also by the fact that the rural life of north Kerry and Provence could be the seed beds for two such brilliant films in the final ten years of the 20th century. We have more in common with our European neighbours than we frequently realise.

I speak of such things because I believe the Government have diminished the importance of the Maastricht Treaty by approaching it in traditional Fianna Fáil fashion with the begging-bowl mentality. The Taoiseach's initial view of European Union was far too narrow, a simple paraphrase of which would be "If you don't vote ‘Yes' we won't get the £6 billion from the Structural Funds". When I first heard that it reminded me of a line from an old rhyme, "They sold their souls for penny rolls and hairy lumps of bacon". The Government should not underestimate the idealism of the Irish, and especially that of the young Irish. The power of an idea is profound. I believe that if the Government had pitched their campaign at an idealistic rather than a materialistic level they would have stronger support at this point in the campaign.

The issue of neutrality has been raised on a number of occasions in the course of the campaign. Our neutrality has become one of the sacred cows that we are now almost afraid to debate. Yet at no time in our history were we really neutral. For hundreds of years we participated in Great Britain's wars, sometimes as unwilling allies. Frequently, England's difficulty became our opportunity and we sided with her enemies, but neutral we certainly were not.

In the first Great War thousands of Irish, from both North and South, died on the battlefields of Europe and even though conscription was resisted here by the Home Rule movement, thousands joined the British army and were actively encouraged to do so by the Home Rule leaders, including John Redmond. Indeed, Redmond's brother Willie and his friend Tom Kettle, one of the brightest stars of his party, were killed in France.

We did not participate in the Second World War. Our difficulties with Britain and the problems of partition made it politically impossible for us to do so. De Valera's reply to Churchill at the end of the war subsequently became the plank on which the policy of neutrality was built. While understanding the political difficulties which gave rise to that policy from 1939 to 1945, I do not think that our being neutral between 1939 and 1945 was necessarily our finest hour. Is it possible to be a civilised human being and be neutral about Hitler? Is it possible to be a modern European and be neutral about the holocaust? Is it possible to stand for human rights and not deplore the racism of the Third Reich and the elimination in the concentration camps of Jews, gypsies and so-called deviant elements?

In more recent times, is it possible in retrospect not to come to the conclusion that, through the fifties, sixties, seventies and eighties, the West was right and that those on the Left in politics in Ireland who extolled the virtues of economic order and social cohesion in the socialist bloc, who held up Ceaucescu's Romania and Honecker's East Germany as role models for Ireland and who always played the neutrality card in their anti-American campaigns, were wrong and remain wrong?

The fact of the matter is that Ireland is not and has never been ideologically neutral. We have refused to join military alliances, and we have been neutral in that sense. It is also true that successive Taoisigh have clearly stated on all occasions on which the issue arose that if Ireland were part of a united Europe it would play its part in the defence and security of such an entity.

Those issues do not arise in the Maastricht Treaty, as the Taoiseach pointed out. The Irish electorate will not be expected to decide on security and defence issues on 18 June. But those issues are clearly flagged in the Treaty and I have no doubt at all that by the end of the decade they will be put before the Irish people by way of referendum. I suggest that rather than dodge the issue we should begin to clear our heads on these matters now.

Central to the Treaty of Maastricht is the question of economic and monetary union. Opponents of the Treaty claim that the arrangements for a Euro-currency will lead to a major loss of sovereignty in Ireland to a European Central Bank, an institution on which we will have very little influence. It is true, of course, that there will be some loss of sovereignty. On several occasions in the past arrangements have been made with our European partners which have led to a pooling of sovereignty, which resulted in decisions being taken centrally rather than locally. The loss of sovereignty on this occasion, however, is more apparent than real. The obligations we have undertaken to remain members of the European Monetary System have left us with very little control over monetary policy. We retain nominal powers but the real decisions that affect the value of our currency are taken elsewhere at the moment. It is possible to argue that the establishment of a single currency would give us more rather than less influence on monetary policy. If a European Central Bank becomes a strong fifth institution of the European Community we will have appropriate representation on it and we will be exchanging the nominal control we have at present for some real say in the decision-making process.

Ireland, of course, will have to comply with certain fiscal targets under the Treaty. The current budget deficit may not exceed 3 per cent and the debt as a percentage of GNP must be reduced to 60 per cent. Both of these rules of membership will restrict the scope for domestic macro-economic management. Key-nesian demand management will no longer be an option and control of fiscal policy will be shared with our European neighbours. Here again, the disadvantages are more apparent than real. There has been little scope for Keynesian-type demand management of the economy in recent years. The last occasion on which this was tried in any significant way was under Dr. Martin O'Donoghue and his colleagues in the economic Departments, the late Deputy George Colley and the present Minister for Industry and Commerce, Deputy Desmond O'Malley. It could hardly be described as a successful experiment and the smell of burnt fingers ever since in the corridors of power is likely to ensure that no such daft attempt at demand management will be undertaken again in the near future.

The Government must consider carefully how they will reduce the debt to 60 per cent of GNP. There are three options, to cut public expenditure further, to get higher growth rates in the economy, to sell shares in State companies and to dedicate the proceeds to reducing the debt. I believe that cutting public expenditure is no longer an option. Expenditure must be kept under control but none of the major spending Departments — Social Welfare, Health and Education, can sustain further cuts and deliver the services we expect. The Government must combine the second and third options if they are to avail of the opportunities now presenting themselves and they must reject the anti-business and anti-jobs approach of the first budget of Deputy Ahern as Minister for Finance. If they do this it will be possible to achieve the very high growth rates which, in the course of the decade, will continue to reduce the debt-GNP ratio to the appropriate level. In those circumstances we will reach 60 per cent by 1997 or 1998.

The question of abortion is now intrinsically linked with the Maastricht Treaty. The issue was very badly handled by the Government by the inclusion of the Irish Protocol in the Treaty and in the management of the events which flowed from the Supreme Court judgement in X v the Attorney General. I have found this past weekend that the issue of abortion is on many people's minds, especially on the minds of older people, many of whom believe that the principal issue arising from Maastricht is whether abortion will be legalised. This false impression will undoubtedly swell the ranks of those voting “No”. The Government have mishandled the issue and I appeal to the Taoiseach to make a statement clearly setting out Government policy on abortion. He should not just give the overall position but give details of the legislative course of action he intends taking in the autumn. This would help to allay the fears which, for one reason or another, are in the minds of many people. You can make all the logical arguments you like when you talk to people on the doorstep but you will not rid the idea in the minds of some people that, if they vote for Maastricht, they are voting for abortion.

The Danish rejection of the Treaty will influence the decision here on 18 June. The rejection of Maastricht, however, by the Danes is principally a problem for the Danes. All EC members must ratify the Treaty, we must fulfil our obligations and seek to do that by way of referendum. The issues are extremely complex, they are difficult to explain, difficult to understand and many voters are confused.

People should approach the decision of 18 June from the point of view of principle rather than detail. Those who want to continue on the journey begun by our EC partners 40 years ago, those who look to the future rather than to the past, those with the confidence to embrace the new and to reject the old, will vote "Yes". We made our choice to participate in Europe in 1972. This decision has served us well and was reaffirmed by the Irish people when they endorsed the Single European Act. I do not believe that they will now turn their backs on the opportunities of the new Europe, on the hopes for lasting peace and continuing prosperity which Maastricht provides. I look forward to a resounding "Yes" majority.

Mr. Quinn

The labour movement is convinced that the prospects for Irish working people can best be secured and enhanced within the context of a European Community which is committed to moving ever closer to a European Union. For that reason the Labour Party are in favour of a "Yes" vote on 18 June.

Since 1973, most of the protective social legislation which has been enacted in Ireland only came into law because of the social dimension of the European Community. Many things for which the Irish labour movement had campaigned over many years had been successfully denied by conservative administrations at the insistence of employers' organisations. Independent and isolated from the European Community and the provisions of the Treaty of Rome, the labour movement, both within the Dáil and across the Congress of Trade Unions, was unable to convince successive conservative Governments in Ireland to respond to the legitimate demands of working people.

The vast body of modern legislation on the Irish Statute Book, designed to protect the rights of working people and their families, would not be there — or would have arrived much later — if it had not been for Ireland's membership of the European Community. That membership imposed responsibilities on the Irish Government to enact within their domestic jurisdiction the Directives from the Social Affairs Ministers throughout the Community.

The question remaining to be answered by Irish citizens is whether a further development of that Community into a European Union will continue to be in the best interests of Irish working people. The Labour Party have published a detailed White Paper on this complex subject and have analysed the components of the economic and monetary union provisions of the Treaty as well as the commitments to cohesion and subsidiarity. These are complex and detailed technical provisions in which the balance of favour or support can be weighed against clear difficulties and reservations. Most Irish people are not in a position to readily assess those costs and benefits. Indeed, most commentators indicated that much of what is proposed will have to be taken on trust. In short, the move to economic and monetary union consists of a large leap of faith based on our past experience and our best assessment of what our future might be.

Any normal person would have doubts about such a leap of faith. It is for that reason that many Irish people are concerned and worried about the full and precise implications of Maastricht at a time when those implications cannot be clearly defined. That is a perfectly reasonable and understandable position to hold but yet the Government's response to such people is to ridicule their legitimate doubts and either to threaten or bribe them with the consequences of a negative outcome. Such an approach is hardly democratic and it is certainly ineffective.

Many politicians, as well as business and trade union leaders, have failed to realise that an essential part of the Maastricht Treaty requires a fundamental shift from a Europe of separate states in a common market to a Europe of separate states in a common union. While the first objective had clear commercial and economic objectives and benefits the second objective has political consequences and democratic uncertainties. This Government for the last 12 months, first under Deputy Haughey and secondly under Deputy Reynolds, have refused to even recognise the doubts and fears which Irish people legitimately have. They also steadfastly declined to make known their own views and to invite discussion upon them.

The Irish people are now being invited to embark down a road which will ultimately lead to a much closer political union involving the further transfer of political power from the Oireachtas to Brussels and Strasbourg. There are serious doubts about the democratic accountability of the European institutions to which we are being asked to transfer power and there is a cloak of secrecy over the way in which some decisions take place at present within Brussels. Just look at how the controversial Protocol was inserted without debate.

In the fifties and sixties Irish workers had fallen progressively behind their counterparts within the rest of Europe. This was particularly true of those smaller European countries such as Finland, Denmark, Belgium and The Netherlands. While progress was made in both Denmark and Finland because of the strength of the labour movement and the Social Democratic Parties, the advances which occurred both in Belgium and The Netherlands were reinforced by their membership of the original European Community of six member states.

In addition to providing protection and support for those at work, the European Community recognised the necessity to further assist those seeking work and to equip them with the skills and training which they required. The support which Ireland derived from 1973 to the present day from the European Social Fund has enabled us to develop and extend an enormous array of training, education and work experience programmes which would not have come into existence if we had remained outside the European Community. Today, FÁS have a budget of £240 million. The Department of Education facilitate many students with grants funded by the European Social Fund in the pursuit of training courses in our third-level colleges and institutions.

The list of benefits from Europe to which Irish workers have become entitled is extensive and ongoing. We must, however, ask ourselves three questions: first, have we made the best use of those benefits; second, would those benefits have been obtained if Ireland had remained outside the European Community and third, would Ireland have become a more enlightened society which would have moved towards the construction of a social partnership and the promotion of consensus between employers, trade unions and Government as a means towards economic and social development?

In the first instance, I believe that, in recent times, we have not used the full resources of the Social Fund to best effect. There are many criticisms of the relationship of FÁS to industry. The initial dynamism with which AnCO were established has not been maintained following the merger of the Youth Employment Agency and the National Manpower Service to create FÁS. We have undoubtedly got a major network of very good training centres, but we need to rethink our approach to training and the way in which FÁS handle their trainees.

Secondly, the combination of conservative forces in Ireland which predominated in the fifties and sixties could not lead one to the conclusion that the political establishment of that day would have made so much money and resources available for the benefit of improving the workforce. All the evidence of antagonism from the past would lead one to the conclusion that those resources, even if they had been available, would not in the first instance have been spent by a separate and isolated conservative Ireland had we remained outside the European Community.

Thirdly, as a consequence of that isolation I believe that the pattern of economic and social development would have been modelled on the British and American experiences with little or no influence coming from mainland Europe. It would have led to the continued improverishment of Irish workers. The exclusive influence of Anglo-American management thinking would have made Ireland a confrontational and adversarial society. As a result, the economic and industrial disruption which would of necessity have been characteristic of that model would have reduced Ireland's attractiveness as a place for economic activity and investment by outsiders. In addition, Ireland's isolation from the European Community would have deterred inward investment by many other people in the first instance.

On balance, therefore, the labour movement must conclude that our experience to date of our participation within the European Community has been positive and progressive notwithstanding the many difficulties we have experienced and in some cases mismanagement by ourselves at home.

In the eighties European economic growth slowed down, inflation rose and unemployment increased dramatically not just in Ireland but throughout Europe. This Euro-stagnation, in contrast to the performance of the United States and Japan, was attributed to the lack of a real common market because of the various protective non-tariff barriers which some member states had erected to protect their national industries.

In 1985, Jacques Delors launched the single market project which aimed at removing these barriers and opening up all areas of economic activity to full European competition. Various studies had concluded that such a move, if implemented, would result in a dynamic increase in European economic growth, but such growth in an enlarged market would not be without severe social and regional costs. In order to balance these costs against the essential gains of the required economic growth two major intervention measures were agreed.

A social charter was agreed by all except Mrs. Thatcher's Britain in order to protect workers and the unemployed. In addition, the Structural Funds were to be doubled so as to assist the poorer regions of the Community and to enable them to reduce the peripheral disadvantages which they had within the single market. The European Trade Unions Confederation agreed to support the single market project because of the advantages which the social charter and the Structural Funds provided to European workers.

The logic of a single market ultimately demanded the evolution of a single currency so as to reduce banking costs and currency costs and to eliminate fluctuations in currency rates, between member states. An economic and monetary union was proposed and it was negotiated in considerable detail. It proposes, among other things, the establishment of a single currency by 1997 supervised by a central European bank. A separate Cohesion Fund is to be established to help member states converge their budgetary policies in order to meet the requirements of a single currency.

In the autumn of 1989 the Berlin Wall came down and with it the collapse of the geo-political stability with which Europe had lived for nearly half a century. An urgent response was demanded and the European Political Union was negotiated hurriedly in advance of its natural time in conjunction with economic and monetary union. In effect, the Common Market was soon to become a common union according to the central provisions of the Maastricht Treaty.

Labour's commitment to Ireland's future in Europe is not at the expense of democratic values. We have consistently criticised the present way in which decisions are made, the lack of accountability and the lack of democratic control. It is in this climate of uncertainty that the legitimate fears of Irish people have been expressed whether it is on the question of abortion or the question of national security, defence and neutrality. These legitimate fears have been either ridiculed or disregarded by the Government.

The Danish decision has now cast a doubt upon the whole Maastricht process. The Treaty as such no longer legally exists because it will not be ratified by Denmark following the outcome of their referendum. All that we can vote for on 18 June is a commitment in principle to a closer European Union, based upon the contents of the now defunct Maastricht Treaty. That is a fact and I invite the Minister and the Minister of State present, or any Minister who will participate in this debate tonight, to clarify their interpretation of that point.

Given that choice, a vote for a commitment in principle to a closer European Union based upon the contents of the Maastricht Treaty, Labour are committed to an ever closer political union because we believe on balance that it will best serve the interests of Irish people. Let me say to the Government Ministers present that the interests of the Irish people can only be ultimately served by a political society which is pluralist and democratic. That society must obtain the loyalty and support of its citizens and its political institutions must earn their respect. This Government's approach to European Union has insulted the intelligence of the Irish electorate and I fear has lost their respect.

It is for that reason that a "Yes" vote on 18 June must be seen as a commitment to address urgently the deficiencies within the Maastricht proposals and to advance Ireland's interests. The real work begins on 19 June because we will have to address those deficiencies in a major way. A "Yes" vote on 18 June is essential if we are to play a constructive and effective role in that work.

Minister for Labour (Mr. Cowen)

At the beginning of this century the Irish people decided that they were Irish and not British. What they have to decide on Thursday week is whether they are Irish or European. It is in that context that the debate should take place and in which the people should consider what they are being asked to do on 18 June. In the meantime, from those two identities that we have acquired in this century — the idea of being independently Irish and of being a member of the European Community as well — we have witnessed two of the greatest conflagrations in human conflict since the beginning of the century. We have seen the European Community emanate from that experience, from the need to achieve political stability.

Perhaps because we are an island nation who may have retained an island mentality sufficiently long, we have not seen the significance of developments within the European Community since the Treaty of Rome was first introduced. Since the Treaty of Rome was signed by the original Six, we have seen an internal dynamic which has continued to the present day, a Community which has seen an enlargement now to 12 member states, a Single European Act which has brought institutional reform, and now the Treaty on European Union which seeks to move from the transition of a common market to the achievement and operations of a single market within Europe.

In considering this overall issue I would say to the electorate they are not involved in a leap into the dark but rather in a natural progression which began in the late fifties in the centre of Europe, between the two great protagonists of Europe, France and Germany, the link, as it were, between the achievement of political independence here, the modernisation of our economy and the new political realities that ensued as a result of the establishment of that European Economic Community in the fifties, under the late Seán Lemass. In the early sixties, around the time I was born, Seán Lemass had the vision to ensure that our future and destiny lay in Europe with our European partners. One can compare that vision, that breadth of horizon, which has been the consistent vision of the party to which I belong — which was not always the vision of the party to which Deputy Quinn belongs — that identification by this party with full participation in Europe from the beginning when the opportunity first arose for this country under the political leadership of the late Seán Lemass with what I would regard as the narrow, false, nationalistic tendencies of those who seek to obtain a "No" vote on Thursday week. That is a vision that would be alien to those who, like the late Seán Lemass, achieved political independence for this country, had a vision his successors must endeavour to render tangible for our people, a vision of European unity from the nineties and beyond. What I would say to our electorate in relation to this referendum is that they can vote "Yes" in the sure knowledge that this is not something new or unique, but rather is a natural progression in which our people must pursue their goals in common with their counterparts in the European Community.

In the first instance, it is a political decision, the legalities of which must be worked out as a result of the Danish referendum decision. As the Taoiseach has made very clear, our essential national interests have not changed because of the Danish decision. Our essential national interests remain the same. Of course, it must be remembered that in the Danish rejection of the Treaty for everyone who voted "No", because they did not want integration, there was another who voted "No" because the terms of the Treaty did not go sufficiently far.

It is important that people realise that, in taking their independent decision on this issue, they should not be fooled into listening to an argument which states "be independent and follow the Danes blindly". That is not only illogical but is mischievous and wrong. For that reason that element of the "No" campaign is something I reject with contempt.

We must vote "Yes" positively, not because of shortcomings in the "No" campaign being put forward. As Minister for Labour I might make this point: as a country which has gained significantly from membership of the European Community, a country with the fastest growing population in Europe, a country which needs further programmes for economic and social development to enable us to compete effectively on an equal basis with the more advanced/developed economies of Europe, a "Yes" vote is imperative on Thursday week. If we look at the demographic trends of our population structure over the past ten years, let alone beyond, we see the percentage of those of working age in our economy likely to increase from 68 per cent to over 71 per cent by 1996. Those percentage figures alone would mean that we would have the highest participating rate of any European country. Therefore, in terms of our population structure there will be greater demand for more jobs in our economy than in any other. That is another reason we must vote "Yes" in the forthcoming referendum. Our future economically lies in full, active participation in an integrated Europe from which trade barriers are removed, where there is freedom of movement of capital, services and labour in a manner freer than has obtained heretofore, a Europe in which those blockages to free trade are removed, enabling us increase our market share, our national wealth, sustain existing jobs and create new ones in the future.

I want to make this point. It is wrong of those — and there are some in the "No" campaign as well — who blame Europe for our ills, who ask what has Europe done for us over the past 20 years. Rather the question that should be posed is what have we not done for ourselves? What more can we do for ourselves in the future with the assistance of our European partners who are interested in the development of our economy, interested in helping us financially, not solely out of an altruistic motive but rather because they perceive the economic and social benefits of a Community with a balanced growth throughout, so that the spending power of every economy within that Community has the ability to absorb the goods and services it will provide in the future?

That is the reason we can negotiate for increased funding for our economy, not because we have a "begging bowl" mentality but precisely because the European ideal is to bring about what is known as convergence, cohesion, leading to a balanced growth within the Community so that we will all benefit from developments that will ensue from ratification of this Treaty on European Union. Primarily, they will involve economic and monetary union, the establishment of a single currency and a single central bank. That is estimated to improve and increase economic growth throughout the Community by 15 per cent, the equivalent of four years growth, on average, within the Community.

It is quite clear, looking at it from our perspective, with the youngest population in Europe and a current unemployment rate in excess of 20 per cent, that if we are genuine about solving our unemployment problem, genuine in endeavouring to provide more jobs in our economy over the next ten years, it becomes clear that we will require unprecedented levels of growth in our economy even to provide for the increase in the labour market of 2.5 per cent or a net 25,000 jobs per annum. That is the reality. I would say to people who want to vote "No" or are under the mistaken belief they can vote "No" and maintain the status quo— the false argument being advanced by some people inside and outside this House — we will reap a very bad harvest indeed should we send that signal to our European partners by voting “No” in this referendum. We need to generate economic growth at EC level, through the cohesion mechanism, to render a balanced growth in the peripheral regions such as Ireland and other Objective I countries and we can attempt, in a political sense, to tackle the real social issues affecting this country, including, primarily, unemployment.

I would ask those calling for a "No" vote in this campaign what are they offering to people who are at present outside the workforce and in receipt of unemployment benefit? What are they offering the 25,000 people who will come onto our jobs market annually over the next ten years? What answers have they got that would provide the sort of economic growth required to maintain and increase those jobs on a long term, viable basis? It is quite clear that on Thursday week we must decide whether to indicate acceptance that our common destiny lies in the European Community, the richest trading bloc in the world which is receptive to the goods we produce and the services we provide. If we are prepared to vote "No" I suggest that a more appropriate analogy than being prepared to cut off your nose to spite your face is to cut your throat from ear to ear while smiling at the same time. It makes no economic sense whatever to vote "No" because there is no genuine alternative that provides a solution to the economic difficulties we will have to face in the next ten years. I put it up to anyone who is serious about proposing a "No" vote to come forward with alternative economic answers, because I do not believe there are alternatives.

Other issues have become entangled in this referendum. There is a sincere intention, which is acceptable to most reasonable rational people, that the issues that have been raised in an institution of the State, namely the Supreme Court will be dealt with later in the autumn. European Union has nothing to do with that issue. European Union is about the co-ordination of economic policies and achieving economic growth in the Community and it provides a mechaism through the Cohesion Fund and increased allocations from the Structural Funds to enable underdeveloped regions to compete on a level playing pitch in the Single Market. European Union is a natural progression and development of our European Community membership, from which we have benefited greatly.

The main reason for the growth in unemployment is not that we have been unable to achieve economic growth but that our economic growth, which is twice the EC average, has not resulted in the level of job creation that we would expect from such growth. We must examine this in terms of the working of our economy. One of the reasons for the growth of unemployment is that we have one of the fastest growing young populations, growing at a rate faster than we can provide them with jobs. We have to look to internal and external stimuli to meet the demand for an increasing number of jobs. We need to look to Europe for increased funding from the Structural and Cohesion Funds and capital transfers to provide for social and economic development programmes. We also have to look at the labour market both at home and in the European Community. If we vote "No" on this occasion who will address that problem? I suggest nobody.

Those who are shouting for a "No" vote should look at the situation because many are of the generation who have benefited most from EC membership. Unfortunately we have mortgaged our future and we will have to pay back for a long time to come for the standard of living which people have achieved over the past 20 to 30 years, most of it during our membership of the European Community.

Mr. McCartan

Most of it under Fianna Fáil.

Mr. Cowen

If they take a narrow view of the Treaty are they entitled to mortgage the future potential of another generation of Irish men and women who want to make their full contribution in the European Community? Surely we should look at the potential contribution that the next generation of Irish men and women can make to their country in the context of a developing European Union. Surely people should be allowed to reach their potential in an integrated European market. Surely we should be given the opportunity to prove ourselves in the far more difficult economic circumstances that face us now than prevailed in 1972. It is true that we have revelled in our mediocrity and we have not maximised the potential benefits of our EC membership. That is not Europe's fault. Surely it is time we stood up on our own two feet and acknowledged we have made mistakes and have not achieved our potential. There is nothing wrong with saying that, but we must continue to learn from our mistakes, as we have been doing — and the Commission acknowledges that we have learned from our mistakes — by now making proper use of the moneys from the first tranche of the Structural Funds since the Single European Market. For the sake of those who have yet to come on to the labour market and earn a living in this economy for the next ten to 20 years, we must not cut off our economic lifeline because people are confusing the issues. Surely they should accept in a representative parliamentary democracy the stated sincere intention of the Government to deal with those issues in the autumn.

People must face up to the issues. I wish to reiterate a simple point that I made at the outset. We made a decision at the beginning of this century that we were Irish and not British but we have to make a decision at the end of the century that we are not only Irish but European as well. This Treaty gives us European citizenship and we will join with those in a part of Europe who have suffered far greater than we ever did despite the hardships we had to face during the war but who know the importance of political stability. In the East we can see the difficulties that have arisen as a result of the collapse of a failed system once supported by Members of this House. People must realise that we have far more in common than what separates us from our European partners. We should not succumb to the cowardly philosophy that we will be overwhelmed by a European influence when we have so much to temper the philosophy that will be part and parcel of the development of the European Community.

We must realise that the ratification of this Treaty is a test of our political maturity as a people. Despite the distortions, the semi-truths and the cant that are doing the rounds, I am a great believer in the innate common sense of Irish people, and I look forward to their endorsement of the position of the overwhelming majority of the Members of this House who represent them. I am confident that they will endorse European Union so that not only this Government but successive Governments in the future will have the opportunity to contribute to Europe.

Proinsias De Rossa

The Minister for Labour, Deputy Cowen, made a very interesting speech. I think it was more enlightening and useful than the Taoiseach's speech. We are faced with a choice. We have the choice of accepting or rejecting another amendment to the Treaty of Rome as amended by the Single European Act. We are not being asked to choose between the continuation of the European Community and the end of the European Community but whether we want this kind of Europe or a better kind of Europe that may be negotiable if we say "No" to this Treaty. The Danish people clearly felt that, despite the powerful club of businessmen, politicians and bankers, they wanted a different kind of Europe. I am not suggesting for a moment that the kind of Europe that everybody in Denmark wants is achievable or whether it is possible, in a blunt "Yes" or "No" to the question in the referendum, to express the views of the Irish people on European Union.

Despite his eloquence, Deputy Cowen, does us a disservice to present the case as do or die, as between Europe and against Europe, the continuation of Europe or the end of Europe.

Neither I nor anyone else in Democratic Left has ever suggested that things will remain as they were if a "No" vote is achieved on 18 June. Clearly, they will not remain the same. The grand design which the leaders of the 12 members states constructed above the heads of the people of Europe will have to be revised if there is a further "No" vote in one of the member states. What we are seeing here is a failure of democracy, the failure of the politicians who lead this country to communicate to people what they were designing over the past three years in relation to Europe. It is pointless for any Fine Gael, Labour, Fianna Fáil or Progressive Democrats Deputy to rail against the ignorance of the Irish people in not fully understanding this great design or fully appreciating what is good for them when they have been kept in the dark for so long about what precisely was being designed, why and how it was being designed, and, specifically, the role they would play in this great design. The stark fact about Maastricht Treaty is that the role of the people of Europe is being diminished relative to the powers which have been transferred from national parliaments to the institutions of the Community. The European Parliament, despite having got additional blocking functions, has extremely little extended power in relation to, for example, the Central Bank.

I do not have time in this debate to use all the references I would like to try to bring the debate down a decibel or two so that the issue can be debated with a degree of common sense. Nevertheless, it is interesting to note that the Irish Congress of Trade Unions who are calling for a "Yes" vote enclosed with their documentation calling for a "Yes" vote a letter addressed to me which stated:

Dear Proinsias,

I enclose for your information a copy of the position adopted by our Executive Council on the Maastricht Treaty on European Union. We are recommending to our members and their families that they vote "Yes" in the referendum on 18 June.

The first point about that letter is that it was an executive decision to recommend a "Yes" vote and not a decision of the members of the trade unions of the State. They went on to make the interesting points: that they have serious concerns in three areas: (1) there is too much emphasis on monetary union and not enough on economic union; (2) job creation and unemployment should be put back at the top of the agenda in Europe, and (3) there is a need for greater democratic accountability, particularly in the case of the proposed new European Central Bank. Those are genuine concerns, which have been weighed up, about the benefits they see in the Maastricht Treaty. I am one of those calling for a "No" vote who has never denied that there are benefits in relation to Maastricht. However, we have made our choice because we believe the benefits are far outweighed by the disbenefits in a range of areas.

The factors which have marked this debate in Ireland — this has been echoed in other parts of Europe since the Danish vote — are the arrogance of those who have called for a "Yes" vote and the contempt with which people have been treated. People were told this was something they must vote for because it was good for them. It is like telling a child that the castor oil they are being given will do them good; they do not understand why they have to take it and it tastes terrible but they are told that it will do them good at the end of the day. Scientific evidence now shows that the castor oil we were given as children had little to do with one's growth and so on.

Treating people with the contempt that their betters know better has raised the hackles of a large number of people in Ireland. It raised the hackles of people in Denmark to such an extent that despite the huge phalanx of parties from centre to right, businessmen, trade unions and social democratic parties — much the same as the line up here — 51 per cent, over two million people, said "No" to the Maastricht Treaty for a variety of reasons. The main reason for this — over the weekend I read a considerable amount trying to find out precisely why the people of Denmark voted "No"— is precisely because they were being treated with contempt; they were told what was good for them but they were not brought into the dialogue. That was in a country where the dialogue in relation to Europe far outstrips the dialogue anywhere else in Europe and, certainly, far outstrips the dialogue here.

We are in the extraordinary position where we do not have a foreign affairs committee. We have a Joint Committee on the Secondary Legislation of the European Communities who never examine any of the material which the European Community produces until it has virtually finalised its way through the various institutions. We have a proposal for a foreign affairs committee, the terms of reference of which will exclude the committee from examining the negotiating position of an Irish Government in the European Community. That is a further restriction on the democratic process here.

Until such time as those people — I am one of them — who support a European Union recognise that the people of this country have a right to a say and have a right to say "Yes" or "No" in regard to the type of Europe they want then, we are building up a store of trouble for ourselves which will explode in time to come. If at the end of this year 11 or 12 member states ratify the Treaty, no matter how well cobbled together it is, trouble will build up if we do not set about ensuring that there is genuine democratic dialogue between the people and those who claim to lead them in the direction we take in Europe. If this is not done people will be alienated from the European Community and will not participate in it. As I said, the bottom line is a question of democracy. We want a democratic Europe or we will not have a European Community. We may well have a Single Market but, as the Taoiseach said a Single Market is a Single Market and no more. I appeal to those who are urging a "Yes" vote to lower the decibels and stop trying to frighten Irish people into voting "Yes". Rather they should argue with them cogently, sensibly and democratically.

The old political cliché says that a week is a long time in politics. For those who have given unqualified support to the Maastricht Treaty, Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Labour and the Progressive Democrats, the last week must have seemed like an eternity as, first, the courageous Danish voters rendered the Treaty effectively null and void and second, they saw the support they had expected for the Maastricht Treaty here disappear like snow off a ditch in spring sunshine.

It has to be said that the Taoiseach in his speech said the Treaty would still have full political validity. What about the legal validity of the Treaty? I ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs to tell us the legal standing of the Treaty. The Taoiseach said that we are legally obliged to ratify the Treaty. On what basis does he claim that we are legally obliged to ratify a Treaty which has already been struck down by one country when it is clear from the Treaty that all 12 member states must ratify it for it to be legally valid? I am asking for straight answers to these questions and not bluff or bluster because we deserve straight and honest answers.

The Taoiseach made a number of other points in his speech. He said that the Community reaction was not an attempt to override small nations. Yet he goes on to quote the London Times which states that unless this Treaty is ratified the Benelux countries and France and Germany will go ahead with monetary union on their own. Which is it — the smaller countries are not going to be overridden, the reaction in relation to Denmark was not an anti-democratic impulse, Denmark will be accommodated or France, Germany and the Benelux countries will go ahead on their own? We need to know which is true. Are we going to be treated as second class parts of Europe?

The outcome of the Danish referendum is probably the most significant event in the history of the European Community over the past two decades. For the first time, a European people have had the courage to stand up to the Eurocrats, to challenge the consensus and say "No, we do not agree with your proposals, we insist on having our voice heard".

The Establishment reaction to the outcome of the Danish referendum has contributed greatly to the public concerns about the Maastricht agreement in this country and has been a significant factor in the substantial increase in the "No" vote which all parties have been finding on the doorsteps in the past week. The reaction of the European Commission and of most other countries, including, to our eternal shame, our own country, has been characterised by threats and bullying. What right have the Danish people to challenge the grand design for Europe has been the arrogant reaction of the Eurocrats. The response of the larger countries in particular has raised disturbing echoes of their imperial past. Europe is supposed to be a community of equal partners, yet Denmark has been treated like some troublesome colony.

When the initial panic died down, following the Danish result, the clear strategy worked out by the Commission and the other Governments was to ignore the fact that the Danish people had effectively rendered the Treaty signed at Maastricht null and void and they continued on as if nothing had happened. There was no attempt to address the legitimate grievances of Denmark; the plan instead is clearly to go through a phoney form of ratification here and in the other member states and then go back to Denmark with a Lloyd George type ultimatum of "ratify or else".

It is quite extraordinary that within an hour of the four Leaders of what are now described as the main parties in this House, declaring that the people should vote "Yes", two of them, Deputy Spring and Deputy Bruton, stood up in this House at Question Time to question the legal validity of a "Yes" vote, of what precisely we are voting for. Should they not have sorted that out before they agreed to sign this call on the Irish people to vote "Yes"? It seems a failure in political leadership.

I am shocked that our Government have been such a willing participant in the ugly approach to Denmark. Surely the correct response of Ireland as another small State should have been to show solidarity with Denmark and to try to work out a sympathetic response to the issues and concerns which were behind the Danish vote. Instead, the response of our Government has been servile and fawning, designed to ingratiate themselves further with the big powers in Europe.

It was not just the Danish vote itself which caused so many people here to rethink their position on Maastricht, but the Brussels reaction to it. It has focused attention on the democratic question within the Community. If the democratic wishes of the Danish people are to be treated with such contempt, what hope can we have that the powers transferred under the Maastricht agreement from Ireland to Brussels, and which will not be subject to any element of democratic accountability, will be used fairly and that our voice will be listened to on how they are used?

The Taoiseach has told us repeatedly that there will be a referendum in 1996 to consult the Irish people on proposals for a Community defence arrangement. Suppose we ratify the Maastricht Treaty but decide in 1996 that we do not want to be part of the European defence arrangement, are we likely to face the same sort of threats to which Denmark is now being subjected? Will the economic gun be put to our heads? Will we be threatened with virtual expulsion, with being left behind?

If the member states ignore the outcome of the Danish referendum and go ahead with the Maastricht Treaty without Denmark then it will be a fundamental departure from the ideals on which the Community has operated, and will raise very serious questions about the relationship within the EC between the large states and the smaller states like Ireland and Denmark. From its very origins, from the signing of the Treaty of Rome, the basic principle of the Community was that it could only move on to its next stage of development when all member states were happy with the proposals. This applied equally to all members states, big and small, and was seen as a vital safeguard for the interests of the smaller states. If this principle is now to be abandoned, as the response to the Danish vote would seem to suggest, then the implications for Ireland and the other smaller states are enormous.

We have made the point before and we make it again. Denmark is being treated in this way only because it is a small country. France is to hold a referendum in the autumn. Is anyone really suggesting if France were to vote "No" that the reaction of the Commission and the Council of Ministers would be to continue with ratification as if nothing happened? Would the Taoiseach's response be that "this is a problem for France, and not for the Community"? Would EC diplomats be saying that France would now "be left in the slow lane", while the others moved on to the "EC fast track"? Would the President of the Council of Ministers be stating resolutely that "there can be no renegotiation of the Treaty to satisfy any demands made by France"? Is there nobody with any ounce of honesty on the pro-Maastricht side who is prepared to admit that this would not happen, and that the response would be to pull out all the stops to find a solution to the French difficulties? If this is a response that a French "No" would provoke, why should it not happen when Denmark has voted "No", or if Ireland votes "No" on 18 June?

I do not have half enough time to deal with the issues that have been raised in this debate but I will seek to deal with one or two other points as briefly as possible. The Taoiseach has referred to the defence element of Maastricht and has said that defence is not on the agenda. He shifted his position somewhat in this regard last week by announcing that it is intended to apply for permanent observer status of the Western European Union. As I have repeatedly stated, the Western European Union are a body who operate outside the European Community, a body whose strategy is based on nuclear deterrents. They are a body which are regarded as the European pillar of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

For the Taoiseach or anybody else to pretend to the people of this country that Maastricht does not have defence implications is misleading and dishonest. I do not argue, as others have argued, that Maastricht automatically means that conscription will be introduced into this country. There is no way that claim can be justified. Such a claim simply throws a red herring across the real debate about what kind of defence the European Community should be involved in, what kind of disarmament policy the European Community should have and what kind of assistance the European Community should give to the Third World. That is what we should concentrate on instead of trying to build up the European Community as a new super-power, which is the clear intention of Maastricht in that it states that it is establishing an international identity in order to defend the values and the interests of the European Community.

I will conclude by stating that Maastricht does not refer to the defence of the territory of Europe, it refers to defence of the interests and values of Europe. I cannot see how nuclear weapons can be used to defend those values or why it is necessary to be associated with NATO in order to defend those values. We have heard much from the Taoiseach about Cold War thinking and Cold War relics — NATO and the Western European Union are precisely that. Cold War relics should now be abandoned and the European Community should have nothing to do with them. We should vote "No" in order to demonstrate that we want a peaceful Europe.

Mr. Currie

I would like to share a few minutes of my time with Deputy Creed.

An Ceann Comhairle

Is that satisfactory? Agreed.

Mr. Currie

Deputy De Rossa, at the beginning of his speech, described the speech of the preceding speaker, the Minister for Labour, Deputy Cowen, as interesting and useful. I would make the same comment on Deputy De Rossa's speech, but I would add that it was illuminating. I noticed the way in which the Deputy distanced himself from some of the people in his own camp, on the same side of the argument. I particularly welcome the remarks in relation to those who have raised the bogey of conscription. I thank the Deputy for denouncing those people and for effectively distancing himself from them. These are some of the people who have been describing as scaremongering some of the things that have been said on this side of the House. Let us hope that Deputy De Rossa's remarks represent the end of those who have talked about conscription. I also welcome the Deputy's remarks about his attitude to Europe. The Deputy has changed, but we have all changed throughout the years. I am glad that the Deputy is now in favour of a united Europe and is a strong advocate of the European Community as it stands and that he looks to the future, to Europe performing a more useful role. I am sorry that that is not the case in relation to many of the others who are in his camp on this issue.

I look at the television and see those people talking about the wonderful arrangements currently in the European Community which we should not disrupt with this Maastricht Treaty. Then, I remind myself of the role and attitude of those people in the past. These are precisely the same people who opposed our entry in Europe in the first instance. They are the same old tired faces that we saw coming out against the SEA. There is a reason for this sham conversion of many of them and it is that they know they are being challenged for an alternative to the European Union Act, and they have no alternative. They are now supporters of the European Community as it stands, and that underlines that lack of an alternative, although they tell us to vote "No".

Throughout this debate we have heard a great deal about economics and about the legal position, but man does not live by bread alone. Among those of us who support the Treaty there is an idealism in relation to Europe that must be communicated particularly to the young people who want some idealism to aspire to, who want to identify with idealism, who really feel motivated by the concept of a united Europe and the concept of a new Ireland and a new Europe — people like ourselves who are proud to be Irish in Europe.

Among the highest of priorities is the idealism about international peace and peace in our own country. The world today is a dangerous place. Maybe in a few years time, if not already, some of us will be yearning for the stability we had in the cold war. We had stability but threats. The world today is even more dangerous. I am reminded of a quotation by Winston Churchill in relation to my part of this country in the North. At the end of the First World War Churchill referred to the deluge, the flood all over Europe where empires had fallen and where new countries had come into existence and where the whole political map of Europe had changed, when he said, "all changed, changed utterly, except for the dreary steeples of Fermanagh and Tyrone which appeared above the deluge". I cannot help thinking that those words of Churchill are probably as appropriate to the circumstances of Europe today as they were to the circumstances of Europe and my former constituency in Fermanagh and Tyrone 70 years ago.

When I studied history 30 or 40 years go there were names of certain places that I had great difficulty in spelling, in remembering and in pronouncing, places like Nagorno Karabakh, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Sarajevo where it all began in the Great War in 1914. These are the names we are hearing today. This is what modern reality is. This is the part of the world the threat to peace is coming from today. No matter what might be said about the European Community, one thing is clear, that the European Community has been a factor for stability and peace in this world. Why today, of all days do we want to change it? The world is already a dangerous place. We have a brooding sleeping giant so far unaffected, the 1 billion people in China apparently unaffected by what is happening all around them. But, ideas know no bounds and the idea of nationalism, as I too well know, knowns no bounds. The Lord only knows what is happening in China and what we will have to cope with in the next few years. Why now do some people propose a course of action which at the very least will interrupt, if not stop, progress towards a united Europe, the Continent which has done so much for peace?

We may argue the exact contribution that Europe has made. Someone like Maggie Thatcher may say that the reason why we have had peace in Europe this past 40 years has more to do with NATO than the European Community. No matter how one looks at it, it is a fact that the Franco-German entente in the EC has been central to the formation and the building of the European Community. We ought to bear that in mind and we ought to be seriously concerned about any movement which would in the slightest take away from Europe as that factor for peace in the world.

Deputy John Bruton in the Dáil last Wednesday said that the European Single Market, the Structural Funds and the Cohesion Fund give the two parts of Ireland a unique chance to build a structure of peace on this island that is based on more trade between us, not on the supremacy of one tradition over the other and that this was perhaps the most cogent of all arguments for Irish people to vote in favour of Maastricht. With my experience and background I could not agree more. What has been lacking so far in this debate is reference to Northern Ireland and the future of peace in relation to Northern Ireland. People have said to me on occasions, particularly after major atrocities, that the best solution to the problem of Northern Ireland would be to throw it into the middle of the Atlantic and sink it without trace. Now another Irish solution to an Irish problem is being proposed in the context of the Maastricht Treaty, it is to throw the Twenty-six Counties out into the middle of the Atlantic and sink it. Politically, economically, socially and psychologically that would be the effect of voting against the Treaty on European Union.

It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of the Maastricht decision for the future relationship North and South on this island and for political developments within Northern Ireland. I know of no one who sincerely believes in a peaceful solution to the Northern Ireland problem whose hopes are not based on the opportunities for political progress inherent in both parts of the island being in the European Community. Any progress made so far owes a lot to that fact and the potential is even greater. Whatever argument there may be over the effects of a "No" vote, one thing is clear: if we vote against the Treaty on European Union and the British ratify it, as they have already done in their parliament, then Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland will be in different categories of membership of the Union, with all that implies. Politically and economically that would be disastrous.

Ironically, my first speech, 30 years ago, was made to a Fine Gael meeting. I proposed a motion, which was not too popular, to the effect that the South had a major responsibility for Partition. That was not acceptable to quite a few people at that time. I made the point that it was the South, not Britain, not the Unionists, who first set up customs posts along the Border. That is a matter of history. Would it not be ironic if history were to repeat itself 70 years later by a "No" vote on Maastricht? If Britain goes in and we stay out, whatever the level of difference, there will be a difference. That difference will represent a reversal of the trend of history as far as relationships on this island are concerned and it will in my opinion put back still further the possibility of a peaceful solution to the Northern Ireland problem.

I remember a saying of the ancients to the effect that those whom the gods wish to destroy they first make mad. I do not want to exaggerate the position but those who vote "No" or who consider voting "No" in the referendum ought to bear that reservation in mind.

Mr. Creed

I thank Deputy Currie for allowing me to share his time. The debate so far on the Maastricht Treaty has treated the electorate with nothing short of contempt. There are two essential elements to growing mushrooms. One is to keep them in the dark and the other, because of the sensibilities of the listening public, I do not intend to announce here. The Government's programme and their publicity with regard to the Maastricht Treaty has been almost parallel to the programme for growing mushrooms.

The Maastricht Treaty was signed in February last but this is the first opportunity this House has had to debate the substantial issues involved. It is only because of the uncertainties foisted on the EC by the Danish decision that we are having any debate in this House. We express surprise at the lack of interest and the possible levels of support for a "No" vote. Is that any wonder, in light of the manner in which we have conducted our affairs in this context?

The Government in the interests of upholding democracy and respect for the institutions of the State should have funded both sides of the argument in regard to the Treaty. This would have exposed the "No" campaign and forced them to address the real and substantial issues involved. Ultimately it would have ensured that an informed electorate would reach the correct decision — namely a "Yes" vote on polling day. I suspect that the "No" campaign may actually be grateful that they have not been funded because this has enabled them to trade on innuendo and scare-mongering, avoiding the real and substantial issues.

Proinsias De Rossa

Give us £50,000 a week and see if we could use it.

Mr. Creed

The spurious arguments relating to neutrality and conscription were raised when we joined the EC and when we signed the Single European Act. They are as predictable as they are reactionary. They were wrong then and the people who suggest that ratifying the European Union Treaty will result in the end of our neutrality and the conscription of Irish people into a European army are wrong now.

In the brief time available I want absolutely to distance myself from the Government's tactics in their efforts to ensure the ratification of the Maastricht Treaty. I want to outline why Fine Gael believe the electorate should vote "Yes". The essential vision of Europe from the Fianna Fáil and Progressive Democrats perspective is that of a feeding trough. The attitude is to get your snout in and get as much as possible. It is the begging bowl approach, with no vision and no idealism. It is surely the best possible way to ensure the non-ratification of the Treaty. We in Fine Gael believe that the real issues in the Treaty should be put before the people in a fair and honest way. We believe that the electorate should make a calm appraisal of those proposals and make an informed decision to vote "Yes". We want the electorate to vote "Yes" because we share the vision of a united, peaceful Europe which offers maximum economic opportunity to its citizens. We want the Irish people to vote "Yes" on the basis of calm assessment of their best interests, not on the basis of fear or greed induced by frantic exaggerations from quarters who do not share the broader vision of Europe.

We believe a single currency will be a distinct advantage to a trading nation like ours and will offer us additional economic and employment opportunities. We believe a politically more united Europe will be an effective player on the world political stage, ensuring a more coordinated and efficient response to world crises which was so sadly lacking from the Community in the context of the Gulf War. We believe that the political commitment to a more economically cohesive Europe as contained in the Cohesion Fund will have obvious benefits to a peripheral region like Ireland. For all these reasons we believe it would be foolish not to vote "Yes" on 18 June.

Minister for Social Welfare (Mr. McCreevy)

At this stage of the national debate I have lost count of the multitude of spurious, inaccurate and misleading arguments put forward by the vote "No" side.

I do not doubt the concerns of many who advance that argument. However, when I hear some opponents putting forward the case that a "Yes" vote to Maastricht will lead to social welfare cutbacks, my faith in their bona fides is totally undermined.

I do not need to remind the House of the strain that our unemployment level is placing on the Exchequer finances. The published Estimate of the Department of Social Welfare for 1992 discloses that we will spend a gross £3,360 million, of which £946 million will go to the unemployed.

One does not have to be either a mathematical or financial genius to comprehend that rising unemployment is the major constraining factor in expanding and improving our welfare services. In that context, are people really serious in advocating a "No" vote for the Treaty? Many of our foreign industries are located here solely due to our Community membership. Furthermore, our chances of attracting new industry here are dependent on continuing as first division members of the Community. As Minister for Social Welfare, I dare not contemplate the thought of the Irish people rejecting the Treaty on 18 June. Such a scenario will mean certain increasing unemployment in the immediate short to medium term — the longer term would be even more disastrous.

Some people have expressed concern that the disciplines imposed by the move towards economic and monetary union will necessarily require reductions in social welfare expenditure. This is one of the most absurd and nonsensical points put forward by the "No" vote lobby. The real facts are, however, that the benefits which will flow from European Monetary Union will, by strengthening the economy, put us in a much stronger position to develop our welfare services in the future in a more planned and structured way and in line with our capacity to meet the costs.

Participation in an integrated Europe will not reduce the need for effective management and for the adoption of the correct policies at national level. By doing so we stand to make major advances and to avail fully of the benefits of a more integrated Europe.

Control of the national debt and discipline in the public finances will be very important in the context of the new situation and the Treaty contains specific targets which we will be committed to.

It is worth remembering, however, that the need for discipline is there in any event, whether we are participating in the move towards economic and monetary union or not. We have to get our public finances and our level of debt under effective and lasting control. While we have undertaken in the context of the Maastricht Treaty to operate within certain specific parameters and timescales, we should not think that staying out would make life easier for us on that front. Difficult decisions will be necessary whether we opt to stay in or instead try to go it alone. It is much more in our interests to deal with our problems within the framework of an international agreement which contains specific measures and commitments to assist us and where we will have a direct voice in the ongoing development of the Community.

The idea which some people have put about that the Maastricht Treaty will require cuts in social welfare services is a complete distortion. It is a lie. The Maastricht Treaty is good for social welfare recipients. The development of the Community up to now has been to the good of social welfare recipients and the further developments which are to take place under the Treaty can only be of benefit to them as well.

The improvements which we will derive from being part of the process of achieving economic and monetary union will strengthen our economy and, therefore, our capacity to fund the developments in social welfare to which we are committed. By getting our economy in order and resolving our underlying problems in relation to the public finances we will create the conditions for a firm and soundly-based development of the social welfare support systems.

The Maastricht Treaty is of vital importance to Ireland. It is the latest step in the achievement of a more integrated Europe. Ireland is participating in that process. We have always been very clear that, politically, economically and socially the best way forward for Europe is through closer integration of the countries of the Community.

As a small open economy we have already derived great benefits from our membership of the Community. Despite the problems which we have, our economy is now in a much stronger position than it would otherwise have been. With the development of the Single Market we have full and free access to a market of 340 million people. Community countries take over 75 per cent of our exports. Irish agriculture derives major benefits from the Common Agricultural Policy. The Structural Funds have brought about major investments in infrastructure and industry.

The benefits from membership of the Community are, of course, not automatic. If our membership has proved one thing, however, it is that it is far better to be in at the negotiating table and taking a full part in the development of the Community. Only in this way can we exert the necessary influence, not only to avoid the possible disadvantages for a country like ours which would otherwise arise from the development of a Single European Market, but to have our agenda specifically recognised and taken on board in the context of these developments. Our continued active participation in the development of the Community is, I am convinced, vital if we are to be able to tackle the major issues which face us as a country.

We have also, I feel, become more realistic about what can be achieved. There is no guaranteed pot of gold at the end of the Community rainbow. We may have felt at an earlier stage that it would be only a matter of time before standards of living here would be on a par with standards throughout the Community. It is not as easy as that. All member states have suffered the effects of recession. It is my firm belief, however, that for all countries, particularly Ireland, the best prospect for improved living standards in the future is in the context of active partnership in the further development of the Community.

The Maastricht Treaty will undoubtedly make Europe a wealthier place. Economic and monetary union will lead to an increased level of economic activity in the Community. As an open economy relying very heavily on international trade we should be in a position to benefit significantly from this growth.

Central to the objectives of the Treaty are the achievement of an environment of low inflation, steady growth, a high level of employment, convergence of economic performance and economic and social cohesion. Specific targets are set down to achieve these in stages. These will impose certain disciplines on us as a country in the short term. But the achievement of these targets will put the economy on a much stronger footing.

The challenge will be to see how continued economic development and prosperity can be achieved through the functioning of the Single Market while at the same time ensuring that economic and social cohesion is maintained. The commitments built into the Treaty give us an excellent basis on which to achieve progress and to ensure that we participate in and benefit fully from the development of the Community.

As well as the economic benefits which we have obtained from our membership of the Community, it has also been responsible for significant developments in the area of social protection which have been to the benefit of workers here. As far as social security is concerned EC initiatives in the early stages mainly involved measures to facilitate freedom of movement of workers, which was one of the basic pillars of the Community.

As a result of our EC membership there is now a wide range of protection for migrant workers in the social security field, including transfer of pensions and other welfare benefits. In the future this protection will be extended to other categories of people and as a country with large migration we will be very interested to be involved in such developments.

I might also refer in this connection to the provisions for equality of treatment for men and women. While recognising the difficulties which have arisen because of the delay in implementing the equal treatment directive in the area of social security, we have to recognise that the Community has been at the forefront of developments in relation to equality of treatment and non-discrimination and overall this has been greatly to the benefit of Irish women.

Let us look at some of the things that membership of the European Community means for women. The Community leads the way, through its modern legal framework and its supporting efforts, in raising awareness of equal opportunity and equal treatment in daily thinking at every level, in all spheres.

Ireland's membership of the Community has been the driving force behind the Anti-Discrimination (Pay) Act, 1974, and the Employment Equality Act, 1977. The EC programmes on equal opportunities covering the years up to 1990 focused attention on a number of areas of specific relevance to women. These include the need to shape policies to tackle the effect of new technologies on womens employment; womens unequal access to vocational training; the impact of the achievement of the Single Market on the services sector where female employment is predominant; and the growth of temporary and atypical work. EC social policy has also been a driving force, as I mentioned, behind the implementation of equal treatment for women in social welfare.

Initiatives such as those I have outlined have served to increase the participation of women in the Irish labour force. Since our accession to the Community the level of womens participation in training has increased every year. In 1971 only 5 per cent of trainees in Ireland were women. By 1991 women represented 42 per cent of all those completing training.

Irish women have also benefited from a wide range of interventions sponsored by the European Commission including the Commission-sponsored networks and programmes. These include vocational training for women, local employment initiatives, childcare, positive action strategies, the elimination of sexism in our schools, the portrayal of the image of women in the media.

Looking ahead, the adoption of the Maastricht Treaty will enable Ireland to participate fully in the third medium-term Community Action Programme on Equal Opportunities for Women and Men 1991 to 1995. This will address issues such as equal pay for work of equal value and the concept of indirect discrimination and the integration of women into the labour market; improving the status of women in society through awareness-raising initiatives and promoting the participation of women in the decision-making process in economic and social life. We are not talking, therefore, just about an economic Europe but about a social Europe as well. As Minister for Social Welfare I will be seeking to ensure that the benefits of Community membership reach people on social welfare and other people on low incomes.

The Treaty also contains a special Protocol which includes an agreement by eleven member states — all except the United Kingdom — to adopt specific measures in the social policy field by continuing along the path laid down in the Fundamental Charter of Social Rights which was adopted by eleven of the member states in December 1989.

The Social Charter, as it is called, sets out a number of principles which will guide Community social policy in a number of areas, including rights in relation to freedom of movement of workers within the Community, improved living and working conditions for workers, the right to adequate social protection, an adequate level of social security benefits for workers and a guarantee of resources for people outside the labour market.

The inclusion in the agreement annexed to the Treaty of the commitment of the eleven member states to implement the Social Charter puts social policy clearly within a Community framework and guarantees its place within the Single Market. In the context of developments in social policy at national level in the future it will be necessary to take more and more account of developments throughout the Community.

The convergence of social security policies within Europe is an objective of the Social Charter to which we have given our support. All of our countries are faced with common problems in the social security field, namely, ageing of the population, rising unemployment levels, changes in family structures and new patterns of employment.

We all need to look to the future and ensure that we have systems which meet the needs of our people for security in old age, widowhood, sickness, unemployment and so on, which is viable from a financial point of view and which does not inhibit, but rather encourages people towards greater independence and self-reliance where this is possible. It is for member states to determine the priorities in terms of their developments of their systems but the monitoring of progress by the Commission and the process of consultation will facilitate member states in developing more efficient and better targeted systems.

There is no point in pretending that the process of social convergence will be easy. There are costs involved and there is no provision for transfer of resources at Community level. There is a challenge for us here. I am already acutely aware of the financial problems which face me as Minister for Social Welfare in meeting the growing costs of social protection even without any movement towards higher levels of protection. The costs of unemployment are obviously a major element of this increasing cost and it may well be that in future the financing of unusually high levels of unemployment in any member state should be seen as a Community problem needing Community support even on a limited scale.

I have made clear the Government's commitment to protect the position of people who depend on social welfare, and particularly those at lower income levels. We have made commitments under the Programme for Economic and Social Progress to improve the basic rates of payments. It is clear to me, however, that there is a need to look at how we are going to pay for the system in the longer term. We have a plethora of schemes and services, all introduced at different times to meet particular needs, many of them involving major and growing financial commitments and many of them, in my view, overlapping with each other. It is difficult for people to know what their entitlements are in many cases because of the sheer complexity of the system.

My objective is to simplify and streamline the system. I believe we can achieve a more logical and sensible system, with clear objectives and simpler conditions of entitlement, and one which will be sustainable in the long term. If we do not set our minds to doing this in a planned way, we run the risk of not being able to sustain the supports which are there. I believe that the development of common agendas and common approaches in a Community context can help us in developing our social welfare system in an effective way.

Mr. Dukes

I am very pleased that the Leaders of the four principal parties in this House saw fit today to issue the statement that they did. It was time we showed clearly that there is in fact a very wide consensus in the political world here about the issues that arise in the context of this Treaty and that it is a matter of conviction for those four parties anyway that they take the view that they do.

I hope I will be forgiven for introducing a slightly discordant note into this debate. I am delighted that the Leader of the Labour Party, Deputy Spring, saw fit to participate in this morning's exercise and put an end to the ambiguity that has characterised the Labour Party's position on these issues for quite some time, an ambiguity which led to Deputy Spring acquiring the nickname on this side of the House of the "shilling each way man" because he has faced in both directions on these issues for quite a long time. I hope he has finally come down off the fence and decided definitively which way he is facing. We had this ambiguity before in relation to the proposed amendment to this mischievous nonsensical Protocol that we have in this Treaty where Deputy Spring was quick to leap in to agree with the Government and then saw fit a little while afterwards to see the light and accept the advice coming from my party on the issue.

Of course, we should have been having debates on these issues throughout 1991 as the Intergovernmental Conferences were taking place. We did not have them because the Government seemed to give in to this unnecessary coyness we see all the time up in Iveagh House whereby we are not supposed to discuss foreign affairs issues because they are so sensitive, especially when negotiations are going on that are of more than passing interest to Members of this House and to the general public. The Government's silly refusal to debate these issues last year has given ammunition to the people who oppose this Treaty for totally spurious reasons and allowed them to claim, as some of them do, that in some way information is being withheld. Spurious claims have been made about issues to which the Government are alleged to have objected and which have still found their way into the Maastricht Treaty and so on and so forth. Most of that is pure invention, but it is being made possible for people to use that to muddy the waters and confuse the issues in this debate because the Government refused to discuss any of these issues at the time they were being examined in the Intergovernmental Conferences.

I have no patience with people inside this House, or indeed outside it, who claim that it is difficult to find out what is in the Treaty, what went on during the course of the discussions, and why various options have been taken in the Treaty. In fact, it was not difficult for any Member of this House to find out what was going on. It is well known that the decision-making process in the European Community is probably one of the most open. It is certainly much more open than Government discussions in any member state. The whole process in the European Community has often been described, quite rightly, as being as leaky as a sieve. There is absolutely no difficulty in finding out what is going on. Any Member would easily find in this House four or five other Members of different parties who are very well clued in to what is going on. They will find much information in the European Parliament European Commission offices in Molesworth Street. There is absolutely no excuse for any Member claiming that he or she is prevented from getting information not just about the Treaty but about the discussions that went into it.

The very famous publication, Agence Europe, seems to know what every Minister and every Commissioner has for breakfast and what size nail clipper he uses. That information is available and much read by Ministers who are trying to find out why their colleagues in the Council think the way they do and what pressures are on them at home to make them adopt the positions they do. It is totally spurious of any Member to claim that he or she is in any way prevented from getting information. I find it absolutely outrageous that Deputy Blaney, a Member of the European Parliament and a Member of this House, can claim that he does not know what is in the Treaty, that he needs advice to find out what is in it and, because he is uncertain about all these things, he is asking people to vote against it. He is doing that for one reason only, he is concerned about his own brand image, he wants to be different from everyone else. That is the sum total of his attitude. It is a most cynical manoeuvre on his part to try to keep the independent Blaney empire going in Donegal. I was in Ballyliffen last night and I heard the kind of spurious rubbish that is emerging and being purveyed by Deputy Blaney and his friends and by the others on the anti-Maastricht side. If those people had any decency or regard for the truth they would find it hard to hold up their heads in public after making the kind of comments they are coming out with.

Although he is not a Member of this House I find the position of The Worker's Party MEP to be very curious. He also claims that there is a lack of information about motivations and the reasons for some of the provisions contained in the Treaty. In a sense, he might be given a fool's pardon because he is a new hand at the job, but I have met no other MEP from any other party or any other country — and I have met a good few of them — who has complained to me that he or she was in any way deprived of the opportunity to be fully informed of the content of the Treaty.

The Treaty sets out to do three very simple but very essential things. First, it sets out to strengthen the European Community economically by setting up a common monetary policy and a single currency. Second, it sets out to make the Community a more effective participant in all the major issues on the world stage than it has been up to now for the benefit of its own citizens and of its neighbours and other countries around the world. Third, it sets out to give the Community a structure under which it can enable member states to co-operate more closely together in the judicial systems, among their police forces and in other ways, to deal with both the advantages and the disadvantages of the opening of borders within the Community. When one considers the Treaty in that way, the inescapable conclusion is that the Treaty is a very sensible, well thought-out and well balanced reaction to the changes that have been taking place in the world that the European Community has to live in.

I have said before in the House that for my taste the Maastricht Treaty is too timid and does not go far enough. That is particularly so in relation to Titles Five and Six, which remain purely intergovernmental arrangements. Perhaps we will have more "intergovernmentality" when we reach the end of the ratification process, with 11 member states rather than 12, but in my opinion it is a pity that the governments of the member states chose to leave the matters dealt with in Titles Five and Six of the Treaty on a purely intergovernmental basis. I think they should have gone further but, of course, I am not going to vote against the Maastricht Treaty because it does not go far enough in the direction I want. I would encourage the Community to go further and perhaps when this Treaty is reviewed in 1996 we might be able to take further steps to consolidate what is in the Treaty.

When one considers the Treaty in that light it very quickly becomes clear just how silly, how inward looking and how false is most of the opposition to the Treaty.

Some of the opposition is based on a very discredited economic analysis, which has in fact been repudiated by those who invented it. I was present in August last year when the economic guru of the opposition to Maastricht, Mr. Raymond Crotty, dumped his theory — if I may be pardoned use of the expression "theory"— that we should tax the "be jaysus" out of Irish farmers in order to make them more efficient and more productive so that they would produce more meat and milk. He admitted last August that even if that idea worked there would not now be much point in carrying that out because we are surrounded and hedged about by quotas. Mind you, I hope that the present Government will not let quotas come into the sheep sector, because that would be the end for a lot of small farmers. However, that is another day's work. That aspect of the spurious economic case against the Maastricht Treaty has been disowned by its author.

I have heard the other nonsense — the people who say that they are worried that a European Central Bank will not be subject to any democratic control. Have those people read our Central Bank Act? Do they know, or do they care, that the European Central Bank, with an obligation to report to the European Parliament every year, will actually have more democratic control over it than has our Central Bank? Does it ever occur to them to think what has happened in countries in which the central bank has been subject to democratic control or political control? They all have one thing in common, they all went bankrupt and most of them are now members of the Confederation of Independent States or Central or Eastern European states which are now trying to make the transition from dictatorship to a market economy while up to and over their ears in debt. That is what has happened by giving political control over central banks. I make no apology for saying that the people who claim they are worried about the Treaty because of that aspect, are worried about it because of something they have just been told to say and they have not the slightest understanding of the meaning of what they are saying. I am not often given to extravagant language, and I am a former Minister for Finance, but I must say that if I ever thought we would be in a position in which the Dáil would debate monetary policy and decide what we would do about our interest rates or our exchange rate I would emigrate, because we would always make very bad decisions in that regard for the reason that our framework is short term and reactive.

Some of the opposition to the Treaty has been based on what could only be called the most ingenious contortions of provisions in the Treaty itself. Mind you, we heard that before — we heard it in 1972 and we heard it again in 1987 when we discussed the Single European Act. There are a couple of peculiarly vicious examples of that species, perpetrated by liars, this time around. No less than a senior counsel, whom I shall not name in the House but he knows who I am talking about——

Mr. Ferris

We all know.

Mr. Dukes

——came onto a radio programme with me a few weeks ago. His expressed worry about the Maastricht Treaty was that we might be forced under Titles Five and Six of the Treaty, concerning the common foreign and security policy and co-operation in justice and home affairs, to do certain things that we did not want to do and that if we did not agree with the other member states they could call in the Court of Justice of the European Community to make us do those things. I shall not say anything about the man's profession, but it was obvious that he had not read the text of the Treaty. He thought at that stage that Titles Five and Six of the Treaty were justiciable before the Court of Justice. Now, of course, he has found out that that is not so and that Titles Five and Six are completely intergovernmental. The Court of Justice of the European Community has no jurisdiction over decisions made under those two Titles of the Treaty. Not a bit abashed, he contorts again and now says that he is worried that we do not have any right to appeal to the Court of Justice against decisions that might be taken under Title Five or Title Six. He is a perfect example of the legal mind gone mad; "you are damned if you do and damned if you do not". The only thing about him and those who think like him is that they do not want to know what is in the Treaty, they do not want to know why and they do not know what it means. They just do not like the Treaty because they have closed minds and they are afraid of the world outside. They are afraid that their own incapacity to deal with these things is shared by everybody else. Thank God, that is not the case.

A particularly vicious distortion has to do with Declaration No. 27, the declaration appended to the Treaty, which deals with the idea that member states should not unnecessarily prevent the emergence of unanimity when unanimous decisions are required. The prophets of doom latch on to the declaration and say that it means the end of unanimity. Do they know — or have they even thought — that we had a similar provision in the Single European Act? Title 3, Article 33 (c) had the same intention and, to the best of my knowledge, that Article has never been invoked because member states do not readily do that kind of thing to one another and the circumstances have not arisen in which it would require to be made.

That particular contortion of Declaration No. 27 was where this canard of conscription came from, they believe we could be forced into a defence policy and that, since ten of the other 11 member states have conscription, we would also be obliged to have it. That is a patently dishonest misrepresentation of the Treaty. It might be all very fine for an eminent senior counsel in court to milk evidence for everything it is worth because he is working for his client but in a matter of this kind — where we are talking about the future of the European Community — it is not only irresponsible, it is downright vicious to try to do that kind of job in public on a text on which our people will be asked to vote.

These people also claim to be worried that the amendment to be put to the people on 18 June is an open-ended one because the courts of justice do not have any jurisdiction over these things; many more ingenious arguments are advanced. I recommend those people to read the text of the proposed amendment and Article 29.3º of the Constitution, which was passed in 1972 after a referendum. They will find that, mutatis mutandis, given the fact that we are dealing with a Single European Act and the Maastricht Treaty, the amendment we will propose to the people next week is, in its effect, scope and intent, identical in the context of the Maastricht Treaty to the one which we passed by a majority of four to one — if I remember correctly — in 1972 when we joined the European Economic Community. Therefore, far from it being a great, mysterious, unknowable new departure in constitutional terms, what we are proposing to do now is virtually identical to what we did in 1972. To present it in any other way is mischievous and dishonest.

There are issues with which the anti-Maastricht people never deal. They talk about sovereignty but if you ask them what it means they do not have a clear idea apart from the fact that we should make our own decisions about all the matters affecting us and that nobody else should have any hand, act or part in them. That notion of sovereignty disappeared from the face of the earth at the end of the Second World War, if indeed it had not gone long before that. There is a difference between "sovereignty" and "autonomy". It is a sovereign act to recognise that you are not entirely autonomous; that is our position, we are a small open economy. More of our GNP comes from trade than is the case for any other member state of the European Community. On the markets where we sell our goods we are price takers, we do not determine the level of prices because we are not big enough to do so. On the markets where we borrow money we are price takers, we do not determine interest rates apart from the last margin which Government mismanagement here can determine for us and they have done so in the past. However, they are now getting their act together. We do not determine interest rates, we do not even determine our own exchange rate unless we decide to engage in the kind of devaluations which we had in the fifties and sixties, the effect of which washes through the economy in six months leaving us no better off than we were before; that is simplifying it in the extreme.

We do not determine these things because, as an economic actor on the world stage, we are too small to have an influence. This notion of giving up sovereignty, which is being advanced as an objection to signing the Maastricht Treaty is false, you cannot give up something which you never had. To try to fool people into the belief that in ratifying the Maastricht Treaty we will give up some great control over our destiny, which we had before, is nonsense.

As far as I know, Democratic Left are the only part of the group in the European Parliament which are against the Maastricht Treaty. The inspiration for the Maastricht Treaty came from the late Altiero Spinelli, who was a member of that same part of the Left in the European Parliament of which Democratic Left are a member. Do they intend to turn their backs on it? I never thought I would hear myself saying this, but I cannot deny myself the pleasure of saying that Democratic Left are the only Thatcherite party here, they are in exactly the same position as Mrs. Thatcher. They have destroyed any credibility they ever had in terms of articulating a consistent economic and political approach from a left wing point of view. I am delighted that Deputy Spring is now articulating a reasonable point of view from the Left and has got rid of the ambiguity——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Time requires that elaboration on that point must wait for another day. Tá an t-am istigh.

Mr. Dukes

This Treaty is a response to the world as it was changed by the European Community. It gives us the instrument to make the Community economically and politically — and in justice and home affairs also — more effective. It is what we need, it is what the Community needs and that is why we should vote "Yes" next week.

Mr. Collins

I am very pleased that a debate is taking place on this very important matter because it will focus public attention on the issue which has to be decided by the electorate on 18 June. It is important that everyone in this House does everything he or she can to cut through the element of confusion which still remains.

I am pleased to concur with many of the remarks made by Deputy Dukes in regard to the negative attack on the Treaty by those who oppose it. Some of the arguments do not stand up to any serious study, indeed from a number of public debates in which I participated, it is clear that those who used the arguments to try to harm the Treaty were not prepared to accept any of the answers being offered. It is a type of ambush tactic of hit and run in the hope that as much damage as possible will be done at a particular time.

I disagree with Deputy Dukes in relation to one or two small matters. I do not accept that the Government refused debating time in this House during the negotiations. Indeed, I recall that the then Taoiseach, Deputy Haughey, made statements in the House on a number of occasions when it was appropriate to do so. I recall quite clearly on a number of occasions being questioned at great length during Question Time dealing with Foreign Affairs by members of other political parties in regard to what we were doing. At one stage — the record of the House will verify this — I offered to come to the House on one Friday out of four to speak on matters pertaining to the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Proinsias De Rossa

It never happened.

Mr. Collins

Well, I made the offer and it was not accepted.

Proinsias De Rossa

I accepted it.

Mr. Collins

My offer was made in good faith and it is on the record of the House. It was unfair of Deputy Dukes to refer to the so-called coyness which he believes exists in Iveagh House. I am quite certain it is not true. The Deputy will know that prior to the Institute for European Affairs being established, in discussions with those involved in getting it under way, the Government at the time clearly agreed that senior personnel — not just from the Department of Foreign Affairs but from the Departments of Justice and Finance — would be available to give as much briefing information as possible to those involved. As I said, we were prepared to have a debate in the Dáil but this offer was not taken up.

I should say however given the speed of the negotiations during the last couple of months, in particular during October and November, it would have been difficult to meet the demand for a debate because situations were changing. Indeed I found myself in difficulty at times because the positions which had been agreed at one intergovernmental conference were changed at the next conference. In relation to the negotiations on a common foreign and security policy, having regard to the interests and positions of those who were strong alliance people and strong Western European Union people, positions changed as the negotiations proceeded. However I can assure the House that the Government were not reluctant to debate the matter in the House.

I agree with Deputy Dukes who expressed disbelief at the fact that Members of the European Parliament have said they were not aware of what was going on. Nothing could be further from the truth because in the run-up to the commencement of the intergovernmental talks proper we agreed, during our Presidency, with the European Parliament that we would have a series of inter-institutional talks. Meetings were held on a regular basis between the leaders of the groups within the parliament — as Deputy De Rossa will recall as he was a Member of the European Parliament at the time — the leaders of the parties, the representatives of governments, normally at Foreign Minister level, and the relevant Commissioners. These meetings were held over a considerable period of time and all matters relating to the developments that were taking place, in particular the role of the institutions, including the parliament, the Council of Ministers and the Commission, and pertaining to the restructuring and reorganisation of these institutions, were debated constantly. While these debates were taking place a number of debates were held in the European Parliament.

I can recall reading a worthwhile document which was produced by the Labour Party MEP from the United Kingdom, Mr. Martin, which was of tremendous value to each and every one of us. It is wrong therefore for people like Deputy Blaney and Mr. Geraghty, MEP, and others to say that they were not consulted and did not know what was going on. They would have known what was going on if they were interested in making the effort to find out.

Ireland has always been very positive in its contributions to the process of European integration, and at this time in the development of this principle on our agenda it is more important than ever to be positive. Ireland now has a real opportunity to be most supportive, in the eyes of Europe and the world, of a Europe that we are actively engaged in, not just economically for our own betterment but for the European integration process to which we have always subscribed even from the early sixties when we foresaw our future role in the European context.

Like Deputy Dukes, and I am sure practically all other Members of the House, I welcome the statement which was issued today by the four party leaders who came together in the interests of Ireland and Europe to ask for a majority vote in favour of the European Union Treaty on Thursday next. This is by far the strongest political signal to the Irish electorate on the issue of ratification of the Maastricht Treaty. This statement will have a steadying effect on all and a positive influence on a mature and discerning electorate. Regrettably, there is still an area of confusion to be penetrated between now and election day but today's efforts by the party leaders will be helpful in this respect.

Undoubtedly, the rejection of the Treaty by the Danish electorate has caused considerable confusion not just in Denmark but in all member states of the Community and in the European Commission in Brussels also. I am satisfied that the Danish result is an extremely serious matter for us all, in particular for the European Union Treaty itself given its potential to impede the ratification process and prevent legal effect being given to the provisions of the Treaty having regard to Article 236 of the Treaty of Rome.

We must all understand that Denmark, a dedicated member of the Community, has to come to terms with the reality of the situation it has created for itself and to take whatever necessary action it might consider appropriate if it is to continue to play its full role in the new Europe that is developing. For our part we must try to help it through this difficult period. We welcome the fact that the Foreign Ministers of the Twelve, including Denmark, agreed in Oslo late last week that the ratification process should proceed in the other member states. That was a good decision, and it is an indication that Denmark is evaluating its position.

I welcome that decision for another important reason, that is I believe it is crucial that we maintain the forward momentum of the Community which we have witnessed in recent times, in particular since our Presidency of the Community. When I last spoke on this issue in the House a couple of weeks ago I said something which was endorsed a few minutes ago by Deputy Dukes. I said then that I believed we had not moved as far as we should have in the development of the Community. It was not a great quantum leap, to borrow a phrase used by somebody else some time ago; it was a positive step but not a large step in the right direction.

Like Deputy Dukes, I believe that in 1996 or perhaps shortly afterwards, the need to move forward again will have to be addressed. I also believe that all of us must ensure that those within the Community who are not committed to the principle of European integration, as we are, are not allowed to draw down support for their non-progressive attitude and position from the results of the Danish referendum. We cannot accept the ideal of a Community of 12 member states in constant competition with each other as the model for the future. A successful referendum in Ireland for the Treaty will ensure much needed developments in relation to a European Union which cannot remain static or ignore the economic and political developments taking place around us almost daily.

We must have regard to what is at stake in the referendum on 18 June: the future of the Community itself. There is tremendous potential for development and we have the resources to allow this to happen. However we must have the political will and courage to move forward, avail of the many opportunities that will be presented to us and face up to the challenges and the threats that will have to be dealt with as we make progress.

If for any reason we are unsuccessful in our efforts to ratify the Treaty, such an unwelcome and undeserved result would possibly mark the beginning of the disintegration of the European Community as we know it. If we cannot move forward and meet the aspirations of the European Union Treaty we will not be able to meet the demands on the Community either from within so far as the internal agenda is concerned or externally, given that that agenda demands our involvement in the creation of economic and political stability from the Baltic to the Mediterranean and throughout the world. If this much desired stability, which is essential if the European Community is to survive, is lost it will be most difficult to recover. If there is no economic or political stability within the Community we will not make any progress. There will then be a real threat — I hope I am wrong on this — that the Community will disintegrate.

I am particularly pleased that the European Union Treaty before us at present has received a measure of public support. That consensus of support is a recognition that the package resulting from the intergovernmental conferences — who were engaged in the detailed preparation and negotiation of the issues involved for over a year and a half — is acceptable as far as Ireland is concerned. Certainly it is a package which prepares the way for our continued development as a nation, economically and politically within the Community and charts out the future role of the Community itself in this ever-changing world. We want to be part of the new, peaceful Community. We want to be united with our neighbours so that, through our combined efforts, we can develop greater economic growth and stability which will benefit everybody.

In addition to the political party consensus that exists here — I wish it were that little bit more and I say that genuinely, but I accept the right of the Democratic Left to do as they wish — I am particularly pleased to note the strong support on the part of the trade unions, the farming organisations, business and employers. This means that all of us together are endeavouring to convince the electorate that there is nothing whatever deceitful in what we are about. We all believe it is in the best interests of the Irish people and of the country and the Community. All together we support Ireland's continuing positive role in the reconstruction of the new Europe at present taking place. Above all, the message emanating loudly and clearly from this consensus is a general recognition that we cannot cut ourselves adrift from our neighbours in the Community without realising the consequences of total uncertainty about our future and the very grave difficulties we would certainly encounter.

In addition this consensus clearly shows there is a recognition of how important it is for our survival that we should continue to have a positive input in the restructuring of the Community. Everybody who speaks on this issue speaks of the very many changes taking place. Of course, there are great changes under way and more are to come. There are many key issues dominating the EC agenda at present which, on resolution, will have a direct or indirect impact on each and every one of us.

In addition to economic and monetary union, in addition to political union, there are issues such as the internal market and its completion by the end of this year. There are developments arising from the recent successful negotiations on the Common Agricultural Policy. The GATT negotiations are continuing and will have a great effect on us also. Then there are the Structural Funds flanking Community policies, budget reform, the whole question of enlargement and our obligations to developing economies in Central and Eastern Europe. There are our obligations to reinforce or support stability in developing democracies and our obligations to Third World countries. Each of these issues is of vital importance to us. We have an obligation to ourselves, as Irish people, and as Europeans, to continue to make a positive input into their development.

The Treaty establishes a new European Union of 12 member states which for the first time will have a common foreign and security policy. I mention that chapter in particular. This Treaty constitutes a major step in that direction. Much has been said about this which is not true and is unhelpful. Indeed the provisions of this chapter constitute an attempt to respond to the pressures for change which have emerged over the past few years. Changes in European and international politics in recent years provide an unprecedented opportunity to work for the goals Ireland has always pursued in world affairs. The Community can be a powerful voice in the world on these issues. The common security and foreign policy will strengthen the Community's ability to work together on international issues such as the promotion of peace, disarmament and human rights. It is important to remember that Ireland will have an equal voice and a full say in establishing Community policy.

For the record it must be stated — because people outside who are against us are saying the opposite — that the fact is that decisions on common foreign and security policy must be unanimous. Our position in relation to military alliances is not affected by the Treaty on European Union negotiated at Maastricht. The Treaty does not establish an alliance or require us to join one. In fact, as many speakers are aware, other applicants for membership, not members of any alliance, such as Austria, Sweden and Finland, have accepted the provisions of the Treaty.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy has only one minute remaining.

Mr. Collins

The Treaty on European Union does not establish a common defence policy. That is a matter for further negotiation and another intergovernmental conference in 1996. The Treaty contains no mutual defence commitments. The Treaty states that the policy of the Union will not prejudice the specific character of Ireland's security and defence position.

The outcome of these intergovernmental conferences as far as this country is concerned is that we succeeded in negotiating a balanced package, one which is truly worthy of the people's support on 18 June.

Mr. Ferris

With the permission of the House, when I resume after Private Members' time, I should like to have the opportunity of sharing some of my time with my party colleague, Deputy Taylor.

An Ceann Comhairle

Is that satisfactory? Agreed.

Mr. Ferris

That is if Deputy Taylor can return in time because we are making progress. In concurring with our party spokesperson, Deputy Quinn, and in support of my party leader, Deputy Spring, who joined the three other party leaders, including the Taoiseach, in calling today for a "Yes" vote, I want to say categorically that the Labour Party remain committed to the principle of European Union. We remain committed to this principle, particularly when one has regard to the possible potential of a properly negotiated process of integration and the benefits such can yield. Hopefully, after the efforts of our Minister for Finance today, the extra prosperity which should result from the Cohesion Fund, if fairly distributed throughout the EC regions, can give us confidence in the process of European integration and what it will mean for us.

However, we should not under-estimate some of the difficulties that have arisen. For example, there is the process of educating the electorate on the whole concept of what Maastricht is about, its ratification and its importance for us. Difficulties have arisen which have created complications not easily resolved.

Debate adjourned.

Dáil Éireann debate - Tuesday, 9 Jun 1992

European Union Treaty: Statements.

Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 9 Jun 1992