Before we agree the Order of Business and consider this draft report on the common energy policy I should like to point out that this is the first public meeting of this joint committee since July, 1974. I would welcome an opportunity to discuss in general terms the work of this joint committee. To a large extent, this joint committee only exists when it meets in public and therefore, for most purposes it has not existed since last July. The work done in sub-committee is not known to the public. The fruits of one sub-committee we will be considering later on but as a member of that sub-committee I should like to express dissatisfaction about the performance of the joint committee to date. We have had serious staffing problems and problems in securing the co-operation of the various Departments from whom we have sought information in order to discharge our functions as a joint committee. Basically, however, we have ourselves to blame for a very poor performance—our record is a poor one by any standards. We were established by resolutions of both Houses in July, 1973 and since then we have had nine meetings, today being our tenth meeting in public as a joint Committee. Our first meeting was on the 3rd August, 1973, there was one meeting in September, three meetings in October and one meeting in November, 1973; amounting to six meetings in 1973. We had only three meetings in 1974, and this is our first meeting in 1975. We have produced three reports, the first on regional policy, the second on Irish company regulations and the third on the harmonisation of value-added tax. These reports, apart from the report on regional policy, have not been separately debated in either House and have not created any impact. Consequently we are not drawing the attention of either House to legislative proposals at the European Community level. We are not discharging the very valuable function which we felt we would discharge when this committee was set up. I should like to refer to the first meeting of the joint committee on 3rd August, 1973, when in glowing terms we described ourselves as the great new advance in parliamentary life here and when we spoke of the most crucial and important role which would mean that we would have to meet regularly to deal with our important workload. I believe our performance has been shabby. We have not met this challenge and we should not look further than the members of the committee itself in order to find someone to blame for this poor performance.
One of the most important sub-committees of this joint committee, that on agriculture, met for the first time in January this year. That is a poor reflection on the willingness of members of the Committee to serve on this sub-committee which should be examining in detail the reorganisation of the common agricultural policy. Agriculture is one of the primary matters being discussed at European Community level and is of critical importance to this country, but the subcommittee is not yet in a position to present a draft report for discussion by this committee.
In my view before we focus on the draft report before us today we should take the opportunity when the joint committee is meeting on one of its all-too-rare occasions to consider ways of having a more definite programme of regular meetings where sub-committees must plan to have a series of reports on different proposals at Community level for consideration by the joint committee. I suggest that this committee examine its workload and assess its willingness to work; and in so doing that the committee admits openly that certain sub-committee meetings had to be adjourned because not enough members turned up to form a quorum. That is a sad reflection on the willingness of this joint committee to discharge its important role in relation to draft EEC legislation, and also the specific statutory function placed on it in relation to Irish ministerial regulations. We should examine our general workload in this way before we proceed to examine the draft report before us.
