It is a rare occasion when a considerable part of today's discussion and perhaps tommorrow's discussion will be taken up with matters to do with, in the broadest sense at least, foreign affairs. We have a motion on people in prison in Britain tomorrow. We have passed the Single European Act and we are now talking about foreign policy. It is not entirely fortuitous that we have such a discussion on it because I presume, though I do not know the mind of the Labour Party on this issue, that the decision on the part of the Labour Party group to introduce this motion must be connected with a genuine concern about the issue of neutrality. It is a very worthwhile endeavour to compel us all to do more than just talk about neutrality in the way we talk the reintegration of the national territory, or any of half a dozen other sacred cows as something we are all in favour of as long as we are not asked to spell out precisely what we mean. This applies to many things. As I have often said before sacred cows have a life all their own — if I do not mix the metaphors too far. Because they become sacred, people feel safer not being too precise about them.
I welcome the fact that the motion spells out in detail what would be involved in a committee. I also welcome the fact that the motion is an expediency motion and is not simply a recommendation that the issue be considered. I regret the fact that Fine Gael found it necessary to dilute the formulation of the motion to a recommendation that consideration be given to the setting up of a joint committee on foreign affairs. I would prefer us to take the position that we are in favour of it being done rather than in favour of it being considered. Therefore, it is proper, since we feel that something should be done, that we should, as far as we can, explain precisely what it is we have in mind on the issue. The Labour Party motion explains in some detail what precisely needs to be done.
There are a number of things that need to be done on the issue of our foreign policy. There are things that need to be done on a continuing basis and process far away from headlines, far away from specific, emotive issues and far away from the moment in which the nation's attention is focused on a specific issue. I would like us to develop a broad consensus about what our neutrality means and move away from a kind of military "we shall not dance" approach to a very limited form of neutrality to a sense of the worth of a small nation in the world which is prepared, while considering as it ought to do its own interests to see itself having a role and a function to play in the great issues of the world, in particular the issues of weaponry, warfare, militarism, the issue of colonialism and the neo-colonial heritage many countries have to suffer under, the issues of international trade in justice and international development. All of these are issues on which we can play quite an extraordinarily disproportionate role if we are prepared to act and be seen to act independently on them.
It is a matter of some regret, therefore, that far from being able to identify a progression in that direction in recent years, one has or wonder as to whether there is an increasing caution, an increasing restraint or an increasing sense of our commitment to what are called partners in Europe. You can look at this in two different ways. You can, as the Minister did in his what I must say were his well put together concluding remarks on the Single European Act — the fact that I did not agree with him does not prevent me from recognising that he had his homework done and that it was a comprehensive and well put together reply — emphasise, for instance, the way in which we have influenced our European partners on a number of areas of policy.
I am quite prepared to concede that European policy on a number of issues is perhaps more progressive than some of the more troglodytic leaders of Europe would have the policy be. There is considerable evidence that, on a number of issues, the official stated position of the Irish Government has been considerably behind what Irish public opinion would not necessarily be demanding, but would be perfectly prepared to accept and support. That is true particularly on South Africa where there is a very strong public consensus for very strong measures well in excess of the significant but still minuscule measures taken by the European Community which affect something less than 10 per cent of South African exports to the European Community.
On the issue of Central America, in the past 18 months there has been something close to a somersault away from the position we previously held. I cannot but be amazed at the difference between the strength of our views in the face of enraged public opinion at the time of President Reagan's visit a number of years ago when things were being said by Irish Ministers and by the Taoiseach in the presence of President Reagan which were interpreted by the American news media as very strong criticism and the position now where we are reluctant to take a position on outrages like the economic sanctions against Nicaragua or the extraordinary decision of one democratic Government to support terrorism against another democratic Government. We somehow apparently believe that there is a middle road which we describe as the balanced position on that issue.
It is extraordinary that a Government which quite rightly identifies the problem of terrorism and violence in this country as a major issue and which invites all of us, whatever our political views, to join in a consensus of condemnation can suddenly discover that there is some middle road between the condemnation of terrorism when it is used against another country. Considering that we have consistently emphasised that the degree of injustice in Northern Ireland or in many other countries cannot be used as an excuse for violence, it is extraordinary that we now have a position where we feel that, in the case of a major power, the most powerful country in the world which decides it wants to exercise its macho instincts against one of the weakest countries in the world, our independence in foreign policy is so emasculated that we have to talk about something called balance and something called a balanced position.
If we have a position and a capacity to think independently, these are the sort of issues on which we should be seen not just to react to other people's decisions but to have a willingness to take an active part and be seen to be independent. It would be very worthwhile if we considered, for instance, the question of diplomatic relations with Nicaragua, not necessarily on a residential basis because that obviously costs money, but as a symbol of our unwillingness to be lined up on one side of an issue where, whatever the merits or demerits of the criticisms of the Government in Nicaragua — and we have different views on that — there can be no justification for the use of force by a disparate collection of mercenaries with the support of a democratic Government to destabilise that country. It is regrettable, therefore, that particularly in the past five or six years since the present Taoiseach took office and since the current Leader of the Seanad had his, regrettably, short period as Minister for Foreign Affairs, that independence of thinking which we had begun to show has apparently retreated in the face of I do not know what. Perhaps it is no more than a concern about the aid for the Anglo-Irish Agreement. It would be regrettable if that was the case.
Similarly, we had the regrettable and to me incomprehensible unwillingness to say that we disapproved of what was done to Libya by the United States Airforce. I find this sort of thing even more regrettable because of the obvious pressures of much more wideranging issues in the public mind, like the generally disastrous state of the economy and unemployment. By and large it is not possible to have a serious debate about foreign policy based on a concerned public opinion on a day to day basis. It is, to some extent, a specialist area. It is, therefore, a very worthwhile area in which a specialist committee of both Houses of the Oireachtas would consider, invite and insist upon elucidation from Government and officials of the general basis of our foreign policy, the strategies at the back of our foreign policy, and the objectives that were identified in various areas, particularly in order to identify how the policy and its objectives were to be reconciled with the universally accepted concept of our neutrality.
A world that has become cynical and hardened should not be allowed to believe that there is no role for positions based on something close to moral principles in the world, that things are right or things are wrong because they are right or because they are wrong, not because it is expedient to say they are right or expedient to say they are wrong. I know that the pressures of Government can make such decisions difficult. I would even accept that there are circumstances under which the pressures of Government may force people to take decisions the morality of which they may not be entirely happy with. I do not believe that a small country like ourselves had any such overwhelming pressure on us to trim our foreign policy to the short term interests that major super powers may feel obliged to take into consideration.
In order to avoid an ad hoc foreign policy, dictated by short term interests, in order to ensure that the maximum public participation in foreign policy formulation was guaranteed, and in order to contribute to the increasing awareness of foreign policy in this country on the part of the public at large, the Oireachtas committee as proposed in this motion would be most welcome. One of the intriguing aspects of the development of this country since the late sixties is the changing attitude of public opinion generally to major issues of foreign policy. It is interesting that back in what are now loosely described as the radical to liberal sixties those of us who took exception to the war in Vietnam were branded, by church and a large faction of State, as being Communists, fellow travellers and sympathisers of one shade of pink or another. That was the view taken both by the political establishment and the security establishment.
Today we have a position where, on a similar issue of foreign policy, as in Central America or South Africa — particularly in Central America where the United States has a direct involvement — we have a totally different public opinion, a public opinion which is quite clearly extremely unhappy with the use of force. The role of the much maligned church — maligned by myself as often and as much as by anybody else — in educating public opinion on the general issue of foreign policy has been one of extraordinary foresight.
I would like to pay tribute to Trocaire's role in this. That brings me to the area in which I think a committee such as the one proposed in this motion can contribute most, which is the area of public education. It is regrettable that the process of educating Irish public opinion about the issues of justice in the world and the struggle between the rich and the poor in the world and the role of both super powers in that struggle should lead to a position of indifference — which is one definition of neutrality — but to a position of being capable of making independent choices on the basis of what is best for this country and for the countries involved. The role of educating public opinion should not be left to bodies outside Parliament. They have a worthwhile contribution to make. If we believe that we have the role we are supposed to have — which is the leadership role, the role of not just listening until we get the lowest common denominator of public opinion but of actually contributing to the formulation and development of public opinion — then a committee of the kind proposed here will be and should be, a major contributor. It would be a very worthwhile exercise. It would be one which, as all other committees have demonstrated, would demonstrate yet again that Members of both this House and the other House are perfectly capable and willing to work on detailed and difficult issues with considerable attention to detail and with a considerable willingness to accept the discipline of such committee work without any of the cheap hunting for publicity that is sometimes attributed to all of us. It would, in the process, render accountable an area of Government activity and of public service activity which far too often operates in a somewhat closed environment.
We need, if we are to develop a sense of our own independence, to develop a sense of the consensus of Irish values on foreign policy. To do that, we need to have members of the Oireachtas actively involved in assessing decisions that have previously been taken, in advising on future decisions and in questioning and analysing the process by which such decisions are reached. Therefore, I am very happy to support the motion and regret that I will not be able to support the amendment.
