They are getting to the point that they are likely to get agreement on this issue, giving them a derogation from the common external tariff. They have not just accepted anything across the table. I do not think you can accept that and go away satisfied, if I may refer to the comments of the Minister. A really astute Irish Government would have been directing all their energies towards this aim and might have got us some kind of agreement in Brussels. The fact is it was not really tried.
I move to the next point, which is, how actively we are pursuing the ultimate goal? We have now signed a Free Trade Area Agreement with Britain which deprives us of the right of negotiation with the EEC unless and until Britain negotiates. We are deprived of liberty of action. That is the effect and it is no good crying over spilt milk at this stage but we now have to ensure that if and when Britain joins we will become a member at that stage and will not be excluded or brought in at a disadvantage or on incomplete terms.
Our new dependence on Britain makes this more essential than ever. There are strong arguments in favour of our Free Trade Agreement with Britain. Membership of this free trade area does involve us to a greater degree on dependence with Britain than hitherto and it is undesirable that this country should be dependent on any other single country. If we have to have dependence on some other country, it may well be that the old enemy we know is better than someone else we do not know. Nevertheless, to be so dependent on any country is a mistake and to be dependent on a country which has so little interest in us is a great mistake.
As a result of a public opinion poll carried out in Britain last January in which 2,000 people were asked the question—"Britain has recently signed a Free Trade Area Agreement with another country: can you tell us what country this is?"—one thousand, five hundred and seventy three, 79 per cent, had not a clue, 15 per cent named a variety of countries, Russia coming top, followed by Rhodesia, France, America, African States, Germany, Japan and China. But only six per cent of the people of Britain knew that we had signed a Free Trade Area Agreement with them. That is the extent to which Britain is interested or concerned about us. To be so dependent upon a country which shows so little concern about us is a serious mistake. It is, therefore, a matter of the utmost priority and ought to take priority over everything else in our foreign policy at this stage, ensuring that Britain and ourselves both join EEC and become full members together.
What have we done about this? There was a plan to establish a separate Irish mission to the EEC. I think premises were even obtained, although I am open to correction on that. That plan was dropped, of course, as soon as the British negotiations terminated instead of ensuring that we would keep ourselves before the Community in the following years. We pulled out of that. Our mission is kept tiny: a staff of four. Ministerial visits are at a minimum. I understand that the Minister has been there himself once in the past three or four years. Some other Ministers have dropped into Brussels when passing through to discuss things from time to time, but only rarely.
Our public relations effort in Europe has been minimal, in fact the word "minimal" is an exaggeration because it virtually has not existed, and this lack of interest has been felt in Brussels and elsewhere. We need not think that if we show no interest, nobody notices. There are people in other countries who do notice the amount of interest we show. There are diplomatic representatives in this country from the five member countries who report back individually and collectively on the amount of interest we show here. The amount of interest shown by the Minister in debates in the Dáil in external affairs is reported back. What have they to report? This is the record since the breakdown of talks. In 1963, the Minister introduced a debate in the Dáil with a 7,000 word speech, but no reference was made to the EEC anywhere in that speech three months after the breakdown. The matter was raised in the subsequent debate and the Minister was prompted to reply and to state his interest in the EEC in positive terms.
It is important that this should be said because it has been alleged that the Minister is not favourable to our membership of the EEC. He concluded his remarks on that occasion by saying at column 1076, Vol. 201, No. 8 of the Official Report of 8th April, 1963:
If I thought any words of mine could help to get negotiations going again and help them to succeed, I should gladly utter these words here or anywhere else.
He did not utter any words in that debate until the matter was raised.
In 1964 the Minister made no reference whatever in his opening speech of 8,000 words, nor in his answering speech of 4,000 words, despite the fact that the matter was raised by Fine Gael spokesmen in the debate, as they had done in 1963. It would not have cost him much to utter a few words, here or elsewhere, which would have helped on that occasion.
In 1965, the Minister made a 5,000 word speech of which 58 words concerned the EEC. I shall read what he said:
We continue to follow closely the various developments in the European Economic Community through the Embassy in Brussels and by occasional visits by Ministers and officials to the Headquarters of the Organisation. Ireland's application for membership of the Community still stands and it is the intention of the Government to proceed with it at the earliest appropriate moment.
—not exactly a dynamic utterance, that speech.
The matter was raised once again in the ensuing debate, and the Minister again in his reply ignored the matter and made no further reference to it. So, out of 20,000 words in speeches opening three external affairs debates the Minister has uttered 58, one quarter of one per cent relative to the EEC—a matter in which it is vital for us at this stage to succeed, if we are not to be left in a position either of continuing dependence on Britain or of Britain joining the EEC and our being allowed only to associate with them on terms which will discriminate against us in our agriculture in some way or another. It cannot be said that the failure of the Minister to show interest in this subject has in any way been the responsibility of the Fine Gael Party because, in every one of these debates, our speakers have raised the matter, have pressed the matter and in no case since 1963 has it produced anything in the following year or, indeed, in the Minister's replies since the 58 words we heard in February of 1965.
What impression has this made in Brussels? I shall answer that from my own experience: it is bad. The impression in Brussels is that our Government want to join EEC, that they have made excellent preparations for joining EEC, have shown an interest and understanding of what is involved in its Irish internal policy, but that in their external policy, they do not seem to understand what is involved and are not showing any interest in the matter. The contrast between the domestic activities designed to get our economy ready for free trade and the lack of any interest in this matter in the Minister's speeches, coupled with the lack of a separate mission in Brussels and the lack of effort to put our attitudes across or to keep in touch with views there adequately—all these are matters of puzzlement and concern to people in Brussels.
Let us contrast our position with that of Denmark. According to the correspondents of both the Irish Times and the Irish Press—they both say this independently in a slightly different way—the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Denmark visits the EEC, one paper says, six times a year, the other says, five or six times a year, to maintain contact and to ensure that decisions being taken internally in the EEC, particularly in regard to agricultural policy, will be taken in a form which will be suited to Denmark's interests when Denmark is a member. It is my understanding that our Minister—I am open to correction on this —has been there on one occasion in the past three years, as against about 20 visits there by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Denmark. What kind of an impression is that likely to make in Brussels?
As regards the different missions, there is no EFTA country, apart from Norway, which does not have a separate mission in Brussels. The Norwegian mission has a staff of seven, as against our four. Denmark has a separate mission of four, plus these regular ministerial visits. Sweden and Switzerland which are not even seeking membership have missions of five and seven respectively; Austria and Greece have seven each; Turkey has ten. All of these are separate missions to the EEC and are separate from their missions to Brussels and/or Luxembourg. I should like to know how the Minister thinks that the four officials who represent us there at the moment can effectively cover all our interests in Brussels with the EEC, the ECSC and Euratom and also our interests in relation to the Kingdom of Belgium and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, which is a two and a half hour train journey from Brussels.
It is impossible for four people to do all those jobs. I make no criticism of them and we have, during certain periods, had some outstanding people representing us in Brussels at an expert level but the very problem of the complexity of the Community, the problems which have to be covered, the total inadequacy of the staff and their distraction with the problems of dealing with Belgium and Luxembourg also make it quite impossible for them to represent us adequately. No other country does attempt the task of covering all these different matters with a staff of four. The result has been that some of the goodwill towards us has been lost.
There is puzzlement, and some concern about our lack of interest, and ignorance about us and our problems has been perpetuated. I am not saying this from my own experience alone, but it has been my experience any time I visited Brussels. I have never failed to come across a number of officials who never had contact with any Irish person, and never heard of Irish problems. Indeed, a large part of my time has been spent in trying to explain our problems to them and to put across some of our difficulties in a wide range of areas.
I tried, for example, to explain why the Common Market dumping policy, which is all right for countries with contiguous land frontiers who can dump the goods back again by lorry, is a problem here. We cannot dump the goods back again because of extra transport costs across the Irish sea. This had never struck them because they are used to countries with contiguous land frontiers. It does not affect the British seriously and they never raised the matter. These officials are interested and they are prepared to learn. Our problems are not brought to their attention, however, and they are puzzled by this. They are being lobbied constantly by the Austrians, the Danes and the Norwegians, who keep them in touch with their problems, and the fact that we do not do likewise is a source of puzzlement to them. This was my experience long before I had anything to do with Party politics. It was also my experience on my last visit when I was concerned with politics. But this is not my view only. It is held universally by Irish people who visit Brussels and the recent visit by Irish journalists to Brussels made this clear.
I want to quote now from an Irish Independent editorial:
There have been some indications in recent months that the attitude of the Common Market to those European countries which are standing in the queue behind Britain may not be one of unreserved welcome. Some important European sources have questioned the wisdom and the practicability of a widespread extension of the Common Market's boundaries...
We need not be too pessimistic in recognising these facts. What they really emphasise is the need for a sustained diplomatic initiative by Ireland in getting our point of view across in Brussels and in making the widest possible range of contacts at every level with the Six. Other intending members—Denmark is the leading example—have shown the importance which they give to such activities. By comparison, Ireland's diplomatic concentration on the Six is minute.
The easygoing attitude which prevails was well shown in a parliamentary reply last week by Mr. Aiken. The Minister said he was fully satisfied that we were completely in touch with developments in the Six through our existing diplomatic representation and the periodic...
Very periodic!
...visits by Ministers to Brussels. Keeping in touch falls far short of the scale of diplomatic effort which is required in present circumstances. The time has come for a reappraisal of our policy—or lack of one—in this vital area. Mr. Aiken should think again—and very quickly, because time is short.
The Irish Times in a report from a correspondent on the spot said:
At best there is widespread indifference here about future Irish membership. At worst there is some opposition to it on the grounds that a country like Ireland, with an economy dependent on agriculture, can offer little to the Common Market except problems and, perhaps, financial burdens...
One official—an ex-cabinet minister in his national government who will almost certainly be a member of the new and powerful Commission—put it bluntly. "Frankly, we can do without Ireland," he said. "Why, oh, why, do you have to be agricultural."
That is a cry which other people might echo! It continued:
And another official warned that Ireland could not depend on getting in automatically with Britain. "You will have to knock on the door very loudly," he said. "Nobody is going to open it out of sympathy."
The article went on to say:
The thing which strikes one forcibly here is that a considerable gap exists between political and official thinking in Dublin and thinking in Brussels. If our application is to be pressed over all the difficulties that it will encounter it is evident that our diplomatic activity in relation to the Common Market must be stepped up vigorously. Apart from the need of increasing the number of Irish representatives in Brussels there also appears to be a need for regular political commuting between Brussels and Dublin. There have been little political contacts between the Market and Ireland in recent years. As a result there is small appreciation of Ireland's problems and aspirations.
We could well follow the example of the Danes, another nation hoping for membership. It is most active on the diplomatic front here and its foreign minister comes here about once every two months for high level discussions. Unlike Ireland, Denmark knows what is expected of it and has made sure that the Common Market knows exactly what its problems are.
There can be no doubt that the old idea of widening the Market to include as many countries in Europe as possible has taken a severe hammering in the last year or so.
That was a report in the Irish Times of May 28th. Subsequently there were articles in the Irish Times of 23rd June and 24th June, in which these points were hammered home more forcefully. I quote:
... there can be no doubt that the bridge of communication between us, an applicant country, and the Market, which has never shown much enthusiasm about our application, is not strong enough.
Since our application was put into abeyance when the British one failed in January, 1963, we have neglected Europe. Yet the whole economic plan for this country is based on the assumption that we shall be a member of the Market by 1970 ...
In view of our hopes and ambitions, we have been remarkably complacent about getting into Europe. We seem to think that we shall glide in quietly on Britain's coat-tails... We shall have to argue our own case strongly—and prepare our own path in advance. Europe is not waiting with open arms to receive Ireland. The blunt truth is that we are the type of country the Market could well do without at the moment.
Those are the kind of comments that have been made. There have also been comments on the small size of our mission and the fact that it covers the Economic Community, Euratom and the Coal and Steel Community, that our mission is staffed by a counsellor and two young diplomats, that our ambassador has been ill for some months. Comment is also made on the fact that we have no resident diplomatic mission in Luxembourg. It is covered by our Ambassador in Brussels. The article also states:
We have no resident mission in Oslo (it is covered from Stockholm) and no resident ambassador in Denmark (he lives in The Hague and is represented in Copenhagen by a Chargé d'Affaires).
The Minister may feel that the Irish Times and the Irish Independent are possibly unfriendly critics of the present Administration. But the Irish Press also had an article which was written by someone who was deeply concerned and who otherwise would not have written in these terms in the Irish Press. The fact that this article was printed in the Irish Press shows that our concern is shared, and widely shared. The managing director of the Irish Press was a member of a political group who went to Brussels last October and saw for himself how we stood. The decision to publish this article must reflect his feelings in the light of the visit which he made and on which I accompanied him last October. The article states:
The most startling and overwhelming discovery for an Irishman visiting Brussels is that the Common Market administrators are by no means ready to welcome his country into the Community. Almost to a man, in fact, they display extreme caution—and some are flatly unenthusiastic—about Ireland's chances of membership...
I heard several high officials argue forcefully about the dangers involved in extension of the Market to eight, or ten, members. They fear that formidable difficulties would arise in the present decision-making process if the Community were thus enlarged.
Some officials assume that Ireland will eventually accept a form of Association with the Common Market as a substitute for outright membership. They know of the Irish antipathy to such an arrangement— whereby we would not have a vote on decisions though we would have to accept their effects. But the people in question point to the likelihood of radical new forms of Association emerging in time, one of which might suit us. It would be a highly dangerous and negative approach to wait for such a possibility to arise. It is equally foolhardy to assume that we can remain inactive until Britain joins, or that there is nothing we can do pending her entry.
Furthermore it is difficult to find anyone in Brussels who agrees that Ireland will automatically be allowed to join the Community along with Britain as a sort of "junior partner".
The harsh reality is that the door will almost certainly be slammed after Britain. Denmark and Norway, in any case, can be confidently expected to push their applications forward at least as energetically as Ireland. And the objections to a ten-member Common Market have already been outlined above.
The foregoing are fleeting impressions gleaned in a variety of formal Market executives. But they never-and informal talks with Common theless indicate that our standing with the EEC is not at all as cosy as we are tempted to assume.
Several sharp lessons seem to present themselves here. The first is that we must wipe out complacency. It is depressing—and reflects no credit on our Department of External Affairs—that these attitudes should exist in influential EEC circles without it being realised here. Something is badly amiss with our communications.
Moreover our contact with the Community seems to be thin, and our activities up to now have made little impression there. About 60 countries maintain diplomatic missions at the EEC headquarters. Those to whom it matters most do even more. One learns, for example, that the Danish foreign minister visits Brussels five or six times a year.
The Danes take a keen interest in matters such as price negotiations between the Six, and they have an active lobby. It would not be exaggerating to say that they have managed to influence the final form of EEC decisions to suit their interests, on several occasions.
The facility to engage in discussions at EEC headquarters is open to any country. We should make more use of it. And there is another equally legitimate activity which could well pay us: that is, to sample opinion in the Commission and its secretariat more systematically.
It is essential for us to keep in touch with these changes. If we really wish to join the Community we must accept that the campaign for entry should begin now.
The only comment on these reports that we have had from the Taoiseach has been an obscure and, indeed, sibylline comment. We have not had the official text of his reply in the Dáil last week but according to the Irish Press he said that the journalists had behaved like innocents abroad and had made no effort to seek the motives of their informants. He also said that the Government had from the members of the Community all the assurances necessary regarding our application.
Now, how does the Taoiseach know that the journalists made no effort to check the motives of their informants? Wesley Boyd has challenged that in the Irish Times this morning. What motives of their informants was the Taoiseach thinking about? We have here a visit by journalists who met many officials of the Commission during a period of days and the officials were unanimous about the ineffectiveness of our efforts. The Taoiseach seems to imply that when word went round that the Irish journalists were to arrive, instructions went to the Departments, to officials, telling them to pretend they did not want Ireland any more.
That is sheer nonsense. It is possible a journalist might have met some individual official acting deviously in this way but is it really possible that there was some devious plot by all the officials? Of course there was no preconceived effort to mislead the journalists and to make the pretence that things were more difficult than they are. These were the honest comments of each of the officials the journalists met. I know from my experience of dealing with these officials that they are different from officials in this country and in Britain. They are officials of the Commission; they are civil servents—but they are also more than civil servants. The staff of the Commission talk freely on political issues and give their views very frankly and go to considerable pains to convey an impression of their thinking and of their views and of the views of the members of the Community.
To suggest that there was some concerted plot to mislead our journalists—that all the officials in Brussels were engaged in this plot—is sheer nonsense and is best dismissed as an attempt by the Taoiseach at the end of a tiring session to get away with an ad hoc comment. The Taoiseach also said: “The Government have from the six countries all the assurances we could desire at this stage regarding their attitude to our application.” There was here the clear implication that the journalists were attaching too much importance to the Community in Brussels, that our Government were dealing with governments and that there would be no trouble with governments.
That implication lies behind the Taoiseach's comments throughout the whole period of our negotiations. There has been a tendency to minimise the importance of the Commission in Brussels. There has been a tendency on the part of Ministers in our Government, whatever about officials, to feel they are the political leaders of our country who are dealing with the political leaders of the other countries in the Community and that the civil servants of the Commission in Brussels do not matter. I can understand that feeling among politicians but are they not greatly underestimating the importance of the Commission in Brussels?
It is clear that underestimation of the Commission's importance is not a fault of the other applicants for membership of the Community. The Danish Foreign Minister does not go six times a year to Bonn, to Paris or to Rome: he goes six times a year to Brussels, the nerve centre of the Community. He knows fundamentally that the Commission is crucial in these negotiations. While we might be formally negotiating with the individual members, the negotiations with the Commission will be crucial. Despite the differences with de Gaulle, the Commission in Brussels is the vital body and just to play up the member governments and suggest that as long as we keep in touch with them all will be right, is a mistake—perhaps a genuine one, on the part of the Government here.
I should like to ask the Minister if he knows what the Taoiseach meant by saying that we had got "all the assurances we could desire." The only assurance we desire is a firm statement, without qualification, that when Britain joins the Community, we will be let in too. Has he got in writing from the six governments, including Luxembourg where we have no representative, that this will be so? The Taoiseach's statement about "all the assurances we could desire" is nothing but a nice, vague phrase which does not mean anything. Assurances about what and to what effect? Let us have something more explicit.
We come now to the question of what needs to be done. The first thing is that the Department of External Affairs and the Minister accept and adopt EEC membership as the first priority of Irish foreign policy. It is the matter of most importance to us for the future of our country, not just economically but also politically, forming the first priority and something which cannot be dismissed in 58 words by the Minister every three years as has been the practice to date. But in fairness, from what the Minister has been saying, he is in favour of membership. If he has not been doing more to achieve it, there must have been reasons for it. In fairness, I think one of the reasons is the practice that has grown up in recent years of the economic Departments taking more and more lead in our contacts with other countries. These are matters requiring expertise and the Department of External Affairs could not be expected to have all the expertise: they must have officials from other Departments to consult in matters like that. However, one could detect during the past ten or 15 years, particularly in relation to our foreign policy —apart from UN affairs—a tendency to shift the centre of gravity from the Department of External Affairs to the economic Departments to such a degree that they seem to be taking the initiative and to be using the Department of External Affairs merely as a post office.
To the extent that this is true, it must lead to some inertia on the part of the Department of External Affairs. If the other Departments are carrying on our discussions themselves and bringing in the Department of External Affairs merely for protocol reasons, it must inevitably mean that the Department of External Affairs will not be as interested, enthusiastic or energetic. We may have gone too far in this respect. The Department of External Affairs have a great tradition of which I am personally conscious because my father was the first Minister for External Affairs in our first non-provisional Irish Government, and in the 1920s and 1930s, when our diplomacy was concerned with political matters and not economic matters primarily, the Department played an enormously important role in achieving our national objectives. It must be said they played that role in a remarkable way. The Department was, after all, started by a Government in the middle of a civil war and the officials concerned owed, or one would expect they would have owed, a particular loyalty to that Government, more than if they started in normal times. Yet the fact is that when the Government changed, the new Minister for External Affairs, Mr. de Valera, found in that Department a group of people particularly loyal to him and his policies and there was complete continuity at that time.
The fact is that, looking at it in retrospect, if we can get away from Party politics, the 1920s and 1930s were periods of continuity in Irish foreign policy. The first Government achieved, under the Statute of West-minister, everything that could be achieved within the Treaty which they signed, and the second Government, who did not feel the same responsibility for that Treaty—understandably —achieved further improvements in our freedom of action, in our independence and sovereignty by departing in various respects from the Treaty. That process of moving as far as we could within the Treaty and then later outside it was carried through by the officials under the direction of different Ministers with complete continuity, and looked at in retrospect, it can be seen as one foreign policy with a change of administration occurring at a point in time.
However, that is an excursion into history. What I am trying to point out is that this is a Department with an old tradition, and that it is important that, with our external relations becoming increasingly economic, it does not allow the initiative to pass to such an extent to other Departments that it loses interest and, to some degree, dynamism in dealing with these matters. This may partly account for the fact that the Department has not been as interested or as concerned about these matters as it should have been.
I think I am not being unjust in referring on several occasions to the Minister's and the Department's preoccupations as illustrated by the Minister's speeches. The Minister's speech in the Dáil in moving his Estimate should be, and normally is, an indication of what he and his Department are concerned about. He chooses what to speak about. He is given, no doubt, a script dealing with different subjects. He can select what he wants. He can direct certain things to be added and other things to be omitted. His speech in the Dáil reflects what he wants to talk about and what he thinks is important. The fact that the Minister in his speech on the Estimate last year devoted 58 words out of thousands of words to the EEC is an indication that he does not feel it is a matter for his responsibility. If he did, as a responsible Minister and as a Minister of great experience, he would have devoted a greater part of his speech to this development. If he thought the question of the EEC was of vital importance, as he said in 1963, and as I think he does believe, and if he thought it was his responsibility as Minister for External Affairs to conduct these negotiations, most of his speech would have been about the EEC, and other matters would just have been mentioned in passing as relatively unimportant. But he relegated the EEC to practically no position at all in the few words he gave to it.
The Taoiseach has become so involved in economic issues that the Minister for External Affairs seems to think the Department should be concerned more with United Nations affairs than with European Affairs, and that European affairs should be looked after by the home Departments. That is a mistake. What we now have is a Department of United Nations affairs which also seems to concern itself in odd ways with Northern Ireland and not always in fortunate ways either. It does not concern itself with our relations with Europe about which it ought to be concerned as the most fundamental and important matter in our foreign policy.
If this Department were orientated rightly, the Taoiseach would not have been talking in recent years about establishing a Department of European Affairs and appointing a Minister for European Affairs. I asked the Taoiseach a question a few weeks ago as to what was happening in this regard, but I do not think he replied to it. The reason he gave earlier for not appointing a Minister for Labour was that he wanted to keep the fifteenth Government post for a Minister for European Affairs. I do not know if there is any significance in the fact that he has now appointed a Minister for Labour.
What would the Minister for European Affairs do? He would be the Minister for External Affairs surely? Most of our relations are with European countries. Apart from the annual excursion to the United Nations and our relations with the USA, our relations with other countries are relatively unimportant and the main volume of activity is concentrated in the European area. That the Taoiseach should talk and think about establishing a Department for European Affairs and appointing a Minister for European Affairs when we have a Department for External Affairs suggests a very odd attitude to this Department, which arises out of the Minister's own decision, in effect, to opt out of European affairs. What we ought to have is a Minister for External Affairs who would have a Parliamentary Secretary for United Nations affairs, which is an important area in itself, requiring separate handling but which is subordinate, as far as we are concerned, to our vital interests in Europe, instead of which we seem to have it the other way round.
What I am trying to point out in my conclusions on this debate is that the Department of External Affairs needs to re-orientate itself towards Europe and needs fundamentally to change its priorities if it is to play an effective role and do what it should be doing in pressing forward our interests in regard to Europe. The second point is one arising from what I said earlier. We need a separate mission to the EEC, ECSC, and Euratom, apart from the Belgian embassy. There is a case for a separate mission to Luxembourg in view of the importance of the Luxembourg vote. However, I could understand the reluctance to appoint a mission to a country whose population is less than half that of Dublin. The answer might be a chargé d'affaires reporting to the ambassador in Brussels. But there is an absolute case for a separate mission to EEC, and that mission should be a stronger mission than the joint one we have now. It should have not alone an ambassador and a counsellor but also expert representatives.
At the moment we have in Brussels representatives of the Departments of Industry and Commerce and Agriculture and Fisheries. We should also have representatives of other Departments. The extent to which we are going to be involved in harmonisation of our institutions and laws with those of European countries, the extent and complexity of the negotiations that lie ahead, and the extent to which our whole life in this country is going to be changed by participation in Europe is such that we should have representatives not only of those Departments but also of such Departments as Transport and Power, for example.
The EEC transport policy is extremely complex and could be very important to us. We need to be in closer contact with it than we are. I do not think our Department of Transport and Power has been keeping in touch as much as it should. I know from my contacts in Brussels that there is a considerable interest in Irish transport affairs; indeed a while ago they employed a particular man, who is a recent graduate, to carry out a study of Irish transport so that they would be well informed in negotiations with us, and he took a year or so at that task. I met him there. I found also a willingness on the part of officials to discuss their philosophy of transport in relation to this country, knowing that we as an island country interested in sea and air transport which are at present excluded from the Treaty of Rome but which will eventually come within its ambit, which the other countries could not contribute.
In regard to social welfare, the debates in this House over the past few months show that there is in Social Welfare a lack of knowledge of and interest in the EEC. It is essential that there should be a representative of the Department of Social Welfare in Brussels keeping in touch with developments. I was a little encouraged yesterday when the Minister actually read out some statistics comparing us with European countries. It was the first time in the debates we have had in recent months that he showed he knows about any other country except the United Kingdom. Maybe that is a step in the right direction. We need a permanent representative of the Department of Social Welfare there to keep us in touch with the enormous evolution in social welfare legislation within the Community.
The Department of Finance and the Revenue Commissioners also should have someone there because the implications for our tax structure of membership are very considerable. Indeed, the Community are working out policies for the harmonisation of systems of taxation where different systems could lead to difficulties within a single economic union and we need to be kept in touch with that. Also, the Department of Justice, which should be so concerned with the harmonisation of our legal system in a number of respects with that of Europe, should be represented and, perhaps, the Department of Labour and Education.
Certainly, to be represented at the moment by four persons also covering Belgium and Luxembourg is unsatisfactory. We need a separate mission with adequate expert staff and adequate External Affairs staff because it is important that External Affairs should keep a full grip on the situation and the experts should be effectively advisers to them and not just operating on their own with someone from External Affairs simply there to make it respectable.
Thirdly, it is vitally important that we, like the other applicant countries, like, for instance, Denmark, should be in regular contact with the Community and that there should be regular Ministerial visits to Brussels and other countries. The fact that we have not kept up the diplomatic pressure; that the very successful mission of the Taoiseach in October 1962 has not been repeated on a number of occasions, and that the Minister has visited Brussels only once in this period, is very serious from our point of view because it means that, quite clearly, the Government are out of touch with the recent trend of thinking in Brussels with regard to membership of the Community. This can be dangerous also because of the lack of interest it shows, which affects people's attitude to us. The fact that Ministers have not visited Brussels or the other capitals and have not maintained the firsthand contact that the Taoiseach set up at that time is operating against us.
Sometimes, Ministers are criticised for travelling outside the country on missions, and very often wrongly and unfairly criticised but many of their missions are much less important than keeping in touch with Brussels. If, in fact, greater efforts are made in future to maintain direct Ministerial contact, there will certainly be no criticism from me of any expense involved and I will try to ensure that there will be none from this side of the House if we make the kind of effort we should and even if it means very frequent visits to Brussels.
Now I come to my second last point. I think our whole foreign policy has to be reconsidered somewhat in the light of this European situation. We have been pursuing a number of different foreign policies, really. I suppose, there are three in number: first, our foreign policy vis-a-vis Northern Ireland which still contains a few relics of the “sore thumb attitude” of the past—exemplified by the depressing insistence of the past on the use of the term “Six Counties” instead of “Northern Ireland”. I was in the Pro-Cathedral at the inauguration Mass and I saw a Nationalist MP examining the notice at the end of his bench with quite obvious distaste. It had been put there by the Department. It said “Six Counties Representatives”. He turned it over. At the back was the word “Nationalist”, which was even worse. It was assumed that nobody else could visit there but a Nationalist, that no Unionist would come to a Catholic ceremony in the Republic, I suppose. That aspect of our foreign policy, the bits and pieces of the old anti-Partition “sore thumb attitude”, still afflicts us. Pockets of this survive in the Department and I suppose it is a carry-over of foreign policy from the past. That is not of major importance.
Then there is our anti-Colonial foreign policy which involves a certain linking with African countries on an anti-colonial basis. This has weakened in recent years but at times was carried to a degree which has caused us difficulties in Europe. I seem to recall our vote in relation to the Tunisian question about five years ago when there was a question of the French base in Bizerta. Our gratuitous vote on that occasion when we could have avoided involving ourselves, caused some offence to France at the time which did not help us when the French were likely to be the most difficult people in regard to our entry to Europe. There was a lack of co-ordination between different aspects of our foreign policy.
We have, then, our European policy which almost does not seem to be a matter for the Department of External Affairs at all. We need to make out what is our foreign policy, what is our role. If our role is to be champion of the anti-colonial forces then we are not going to move easily into a Europe which is still somewhat sensitive on that account. If we want to get into Europe, we will have to be a little less noisy on some of these other issues.
Foreign policy involves a compounding of principle and interest—I do not mean in the financial sense. There are matters of principle on which we must stand. Where principles are concerned, certainly, we must do the right thing and not allow our interests to intrude. But there are many cases where there are no issues of principle involved, no issues that we need to get involved in and it is right that every country should have regard to its interests on these occasions and not gratuitously offend other countries when its interests will be seriously affected.
I do not think we have worked out the right combination of foreign policies which would involve an independent position with the United Nations, an independent position associated with the Western block, not neutralist but independent. We are still too much tied to America's coat tails, too inclined to have our vote determined by how America votes, still a little too influenced by this anti-colonial idea, and have not sorted out these things in relation to Europe. I do not think that anybody could clearly explain our position in the spectrum of foreign affairs because we have a number of different foreign policies for different purposes, not co-ordinated into one. We need to have a much better thought-out foreign policy if we are to succeed in our efforts to get into Europe.
Finally, as the last of these points I want to make as to what needs to be done, I do think we need much more active public relations in Europe, not just in Brussels, not just negotiations at diplomatic level and Ministerial visits. It is terribly depressing to see how little Europeans know about us. I met a person in one of the European capitals—a Minister— who asked how we liked our new Opposition Leader, Mr. Heath. The Minister was not aware that we had a separate Government. It had slipped his mind. So unconscious are people of the realities of our position that you get this extraordinary lack of knowledge of this country and its interests. The Government should do something more about this. They ought to finance visits by Irish people who could make an impression there. I do not want to mention names but I have in mind Dr. MacLiammóir and people of that kind who can speak the languages of the various countries and who would be names that would attract people and would add to our prestige. I do not think enough is done in that way to put before the people of Europe our culture, the contribution we can make, and to make them conscious of the fact that we are a separate nation and must be treated fairly and that regard must be had to our interests in the negotiations that will ultimately take place.
I said at the outset that I was going to be critical. It is the purpose of this debate. I think it is very important that these things should be discussed. I hope the Minister will take what I have said in good part. He will, no doubt, have to try to refute a good deal of it. That is the normal practice in politics. Whether you accept it or not, you have to refute it. I hope some of the points I have made will have some impact and that as a result of this debate there will be greater interest and activity in this field.
I am speaking in this way, not from any Party point of view because I know my views are shared, indeed, by many people in the Fianna Fáil Party and also more widely, and this is not a political issue. We are not talking here about whether we go into Europe or not. There is no disagreement on policy here at all. It is merely how we can effectively implement the policy and there is legitimate concern among people, whether in politics or not, no matter on what side, that we have not been prosecuting this matter as effectively as we should. I hope that this debate and other contributtions that may be made will lead to a more active European policy. I am very pleased that the Taoiseach has announced that there will be a ministerial mission. If the Minister can tell us more about that, as to when it will take place, and what Ministers will go, that would be encouraging and helpful.
The fact that we have had that reaction since the motion was put down and articles appeared in the press, indicates some proper sensitivity on the part of the Government on this issue. We are not disagreeing in principle on this. Any Government can make mistakes, particularly mistakes of omission. The purpose of Parliament is to direct attention to these things and to ensure that, if a Government are not following adequately some particular part of their policy or joint national policy, adequate pressure is put on them to do so. Even though the Minister may feel obliged to refute the various things I have said, I hope, having done that, he will go back and have some regard to those criticisms which he thinks most reasonable amongst those I have made.