My main concern in addressing myself to this Bill is to ensure that there is the maximum participation in decision-making in the Community by directly elected democratic representatives. My main criticism of the EEC as it exists is the weakness of the democratic voice in its decision-making. There are a number of institutions through which a democratic voice can take effect. Some are weaker than others so far as their democratic content is concerned. The first one which was adverted to last night by Deputy de Valera was the Council of Ministers. He attached very great importance to preserving the present powers and functions of the Council of Ministers. He claimed it was directly responsible to the national Governments who were directly elected by the people.
I think his thesis was faulty in some respects. While I do not deny that there is a definite obvious democratic content in the fact that they are Government Ministers of the various countries sitting around a table, there is the difficulty that members of Parliament seeking to check the activities of their Ministers who are on the Council are at a significant disadvantage. This arises from the fact that one does not know what line the particular Minister has taken on a particular issue. One does not know what line he will take on any future issue. The discussions are confidential and therefore the degree of control which one can exercise through national Parliaments on Ministers in the Council is not very significant due to the secrecy of the discussions.
It is further attenuated by the fact that these discussions by the Council of Ministers can often be very lengthy. There are all-night decision-making sessions. It is quite clear from this that if the Council of Ministers are, as they are at the moment, effectively locked up in one room and told to take a decision and not to leave until they have done so, there is very little opportunity for referral back in the course of the decision-making to their own Cabinets, let alone to the national parliaments. Clearly the democratic voice which can be expressed through the Council of Ministers is not very strong due to the secrecy, and due to the fact that decisions must be taken at a single sitting. Simply to say that leaving the Council of Ministers as it is preserves a valuable democratic voice to my mind is not fair. We need other institutions.
The second existing institution which provides for a democratic voice in the Community is the European Parliament. I am not at all satisfied that this provides an effective democratic voice. It is important to recognise that the powers of the Community Parliament are essentially consultative. They are consulted on directives. There is no compulsion in any discussion on the Council of Ministers, who make the final decisions, to accept the views of the Parliament. Therefore, to a significant degree the debates are unreal. It is worth noting in passing that many people say, and Continental commentators say, that the most significant power of the European Parliament is that it can put Parliamentary Questions to the Commission and have them replied to.
It is worth noting the length of time it takes to get a reply. In normal circumstances in this House we can certainly get a written reply in four or five days. In the Community Parliament, so far as I know, it takes at least a month to get a reply to a Parliamentary Question. The Commission have the power to say unilaterally: "We cannot reply to that this month. We will put it off for another month." There could be delays of two, three or four months in getting answers to important questions. Quite clearly that greatly reduces the democratic potency of the Parliamentary Question in the European Parliament as distinct from the form it takes in this Parliament.
It is fair to say that the Members must be in Brussels, or wherever the Parliament or its committees are sitting, for one-third of the year or more. This time will probably be added to by the journeys to and fro. Plane connections may not be as suitable as they should be, with the result that about half of the year will be spent by members of the European Parliament away from their constituencies. This is more remarkable in this country than it is in Continental Europe because of the distance between here and wherever the Parliament is sitting. Therefore, those members will not be very close to their constituents and they will not be open to the sort of informal contact with their constituents which is, perhaps, the most effective way in which Deputies can learn about issues and bring them forward here. It is not through meeting formal delegations that democracy really has its effect; it is through a Deputy moving around his constituency and hearing people talking, very often hearing casual remarks, that he learns of an issue which is important and which may become of great concern.
If the members of the European Parliament have to spend half the year away from their constituencies, and perhaps the rest of the year sitting in this House trying to maintain their seats here by making some contribution in the National Parliament, their response to public opinion in their constituencies will be much less than the response of other Members of the House to the feelings of their constituents. Under our system of election, proportional representation in multi-seat constituencies, there is always the possibility that, if a man is elected to the European Parliament, another member of his own party will be working away in the constituency and he may be able to undermine his position by his greater presence in the constituency.
This will mean that members of the European Parliament will be at a significant disadvantage. They will be faced with the choice of either doing their job properly in Europe, which means being away for a good deal of the time, in which case they run the risk of losing their seats at the next election, or of not doing their job in Europe and staying at home and trying to hold their seats, in which case there is hardly any point in having them in the European Parliament. This is further aggravated in the case of Ireland because we are further away from where the European Parliament will meet. Therefore the democratic voice of Ireland expressed through the European Parliament will be greatly decreased. We must find some way around this. I will come to the ways in which we could do it later.
At this stage I am establishing the weakness of the Council of Ministers as a democratic voice, due to the secrecy of their deliberations, and due to the fact that very often decisions are taken at one sitting without the possibility of a referral back. I am also demonstrating the weakness of the European Parliament as a democratic voice: first, because it is consultative essentially; secondly because of the delay in getting repiles to Parliamentary Questions and, thirdly, because in the case of Ireland Members will be away from their constituencies for a long time, will lose contact and therefore will lose effective democratic representation.
In regard to Ireland more so than in regard to the other countries, there is a very strong case to be made for having Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann very closely involved in the Community legislative process, and able to influence as far as possible the decisions of the Irish member on the Council of Ministers, and able also, because of the fact that debates have taken place here, to put forward ideas to the Irish representatives in the European Parliament thereby giving them greater material on which to proceed. Clearly 144 minds are better than ten, and better than one in the case of the member of the Council of Ministers.
The important thing is to get as many minds as possible to concentrate on the EEC draft regulations and draft directives which are coming before us, so that the Irish Minister on the Council of Ministers, and the Irish members of the European Parliament, will be as well informed as possible on opinion in Ireland and will have the benefit of as many ideas as possible. It is important that we do not approach this matter as we approach many other legislative proposals, as a partisan issue. The Irish Minister will have much to gain from hearing the views of the Opposition on issues of this character. It will strengthen his position considerably if, in relation to a particular proposal, he is able to point not only to his own opinion that a particular aspect of it is undesirable but also to the opinion expressed by all parties here. He would then go to the Council of Ministers in a much stronger position to demonstrate the danger of any particular proposal from the Irish point of view.
It is vital that provision be made for consultation to the maximum degree with this House in relation to Community legislative proposals. The only provision in this Bill for such consultation is an extremely weak one. This is my strongest criticism of this measure. There is no need for the provision to be so weak and we could greatly strengthen the voice of this House in regard to EEC legislative proposals without in any way endangering our membership of the European Community. I am frankly surprised that the Government, who traditionally have claimed to be more concerned with sovereignty than the other parties in this House—a claim I dispute—should be the people to introduce safeguards for Parliament in regard to EEC legislative proposals significantly weaker even than those being taken in Britain and a great deal weaker than the safeguards possible.
I would have expected that the protection of the Oireachtas from the point of view of the EEC legislative proposals would have been much stronger than those in Britain because of the traditionally expressed views of the Government party. It is disconcerting, to say the least of it, that they should be so much weaker. I find this difficult to understand. The only provision here in regard to regulations is that they will take effect immediately but their effect will lapse unless they are confirmed by a decision of the Oireachtas within one year. This is a very weak position indeed. First of all, we will be asked to discuss a fait accompli. We will be given a list of regulations already in force in the country and asked to either approve or disapprove. There will really be no question of disapproving and the whole debate will, therefore, be quite unreal. To illustrate my point, there is a list of regulations here which, by this particular Bill we are putting through at the moment, we are making effective. How many of the contributions in the debate so far have been related to discussing Directive 69/77 of 4th March, 1969 amending the Council Directive of 7th July, 1964 laying down detailed provisions concerning transitional measures in respect of activities of all self-employed persons in manufacturing and processing industries falling within ISIC Groups 23-40? Not one speaker referred to it. There was no discussion on it. Why? Because it is a fait accompli and there would be no point in discussing it. Wherein lies the alleged safeguard then? The Government are proposing to give us an opportunity of discussing after the event EEC legislation which has already been put into effect in the form of a regulation by the Irish Minister. That will certainly not be worth very much. I am surprised that this Government, who claim they are the upholders of sovereignty and who have cavilled over phrases in order to demonstrate their minute concern with the preservation of sovereignty, should now be prepared to bring in a Bill here practically devoid of any safeguards. There should be written into this Bill provisions with regard to consultation with the democratically elected representatives of the people who sit in this House.
I would divide these safeguards into two stages. First of all, in regard to regulations and directives in draft form submitted by the Commission to the Council, it is essential that there should be full discussion of all proposals in advance of any decision being taken by the Council. There must be a discussion on the draft. That would be the most meaningful discussion of all because we would be expressing an opinion on something which has not yet been decided and our view would then be made known by our Minister to the Council. That is of paramount importance. There is no provision in this measure to give effect to that.
The second stage at which we should discuss is when a directive or a regulation has been decided on by the Council. Again, there should be an opportunity to discuss such regulation or directive, its implementation and the form of its implementation here. That will be important in regard to directives because it is only in regard to directives that there is no direct applicability of the Community regulation here and there is a possibility of the Irish Government interpreting the directive in a certain way when it comes to implementation. There is need for opportunity for discussion at that level, need for discussion on Government interpretation and implementation. The House must be brought in at that stage in relation to directives. At the earlier stage, when we are discussing drafts, there will be an opportunity for the House to discuss not only directives but also regulations which, once decided by the Council of Ministers, will become directly applicable here.
The practice adopted by the Government should be as follows: once a draft regulation or a draft directive is published it should immediately be laid before the House and attention drawn to it in the same way as attention is drawn to various Government orders. It should also be made available in an English translation. I have a criticism to make of the present draft regulations and directives. They are available in French only in the Journal Officiel in the Library. Some Members have a facility in French. I can read French; I cannot speak it very well, but the bulk of Members can neither read nor speak French, and it is not much use having material down in the Library which is available only in French. I know that if ever I wanted a particular directive I could go to a Government Department and they would probably provide me with an English translation of it. But that leaves it to me to discover that there is something of significance in it and then to go and get an English translation. That is not a great safeguard from the point of view of most Members of the House, because if they do not read French they will not know if there is anything of significance in it and, therefore, will not ask for a translation.
That is a very serious failing and if the Government are concerned about the preservation of the powers of this House in regard to legislation which is going on now and will continue to go on right up to the 1st January in the Community, and if they want their views, which are going to be expressed through the agreed procedures for interim consultation, to reflect the democratic voice in this House, they must make all those directives available in an English translation for Members of this House so that they can put forward their views in whatever way is open to them. What I have proposed is that any draft proposals should be laid before the House and placed in English translation in the Library. I would then propose that every month a day should be set aside in this House on which the Government would not seek the approval of the House on these directives but have a motion taking note of the proposals which have been introduced, and at that stage circulate prior to that debate an explanatory memorandum setting out broadly the proposals which have been made in the intervening period and giving Deputies an opportunity of expressing themselves on those matters.
In addition to this, there should be a committee of members which would, prior to that debate, also go into the provisions of those directives and publish an independent report on the draft directives and the draft regulations which would also be circulated to Deputies, so that Deputies would be able to discuss the draft directives and the draft regulations, first of all, with the possibility of going to read them in English translation in the Library; and, secondly, having before them the Government's interpretation of their effect; and, thirdly, having before them the interpretation of their effect as expressed by an independent committee of the House. In that way we could have a meaningful debate.
Quite clearly, at the end of that debate it could not and should not be possible for this House to tie the hands of the Irish Minister who was going to the Council of Ministers. The Council of Ministers would cease to be effective if the council members could not take decisions on their own account. Therefore, the motion discussing these draft regulations should only be a "take note" resolution. However, the Ministers would have the benefit of a debate in which Deputies of all sides and of all backgrounds could contribute on one day each month. I do not think that one day each month is asking too much. We have been told that this is the most momentous decision for 40 years in this State. If it is all that momentous and if accession to the EEC is all that important to the community this facility should be made available so that this House would be able to express its view—and this is the important point—prior to any decision being actually taken.
Now we come to the question of matters which have already been decided and what is the best way of involving this House in deciding how a particular proposal which has already been adopted by the Community in the form of a directive will be implemented in this country and the Government's interpretation of this. Section 3 of the Bill proposes that this should be brought into effect by means of a regulation. It says nothing whatever about legislation. It says:
A Minister of State may make regulations for enabling section 2 of this Act to have full effect.
On page seven of the Taoiseach's speech he says:
Some are more important than others and it may be that it will be found desirable——
Nobody says by whom.
——in particular cases to implement by statute Community legislation which might not be directly applicable.
I suppose it would be possible to introduce legislation even though section 3 only makes provision for regulations. However, I would think it better if after the words "A Minister of State may make regulations for enabling section 2 of this Act to have full effect" section 3 went on to say: "or section 2 of this Act may have full effect by means of legislation." But that may not be necessary. I come to the more important point in the Taoiseach's speech in which he says that it may be that it will be found desirable to have legislation instead of just regulations. Who is going to decide? There is no provision here for a committee of the House or for the House to decide whether legislation will be necessary. The Government will decide. Everyone knows the Government want the minimum inconvenience. They do not want discussions at great length in this House. They want to shuffle everything through as quickly as possible. The civil servants do not want to be bothered coming in here to advise and getting involved in issues when everything is already tidied up and all that is needed is a regulation.
What is proposed here is that it be left to the Government, the very people who do not want debates in this House, to decide whether or not there shall be a debate. To my mind it is essential that the decision as to whether or not a particular directive will be implemented by legislation or by regulation should not be in the hands of the Government, at least it should be in the hands of a Dáil committee if we are not actually going to lay down precise criteria in this House whereby it would be decided. I said earlier I felt it was necessary that there should be a committee of the House which would present a report on all draft regulations and directives which have been published to facilitate an open debate here in the House one day each month. I think that same committee which, to my mind should have a majority of Opposition Members—but that is not essential—should be the body to decide whether or not a particular directive shall be implemented by means of regulation or by means of statute.
There is another point in regard to these regulations. Not only are the Government to arrogate to themselves the power to decide whether something shall be done by regulation or by statute but they are, in relation to these regulations, providing a more diminished power for this House to check the contents of these regulations than even exists with regard to regulations which are laid before us in the normal way at present and, of course, there is a great deal of complaint about delegated legislation and the fact that there is not, effectively, much opportunity for these documents to be discussed by the House. While a Member may get an hour to discuss a matter if he raises it within 21 days, the amount of reading involved and the problem of having to watch every regulation makes it difficult for any Member to avail of that power. That power is difficult enough to exercise but the check which the Government propose to introduce here is much less. It is not sufficient for one Member to "cop on" to what is in the regulation and get the matter raised. According to my interpretation of section 4 (2) it is necessary that the majority of Dáil Éireann decide that a particular regulation is defective and should be discussed. How, in God's name, would one get a majority of Dáil Éireann? The Dáil has, first of all, to be in recess for this to happen. Suppose I got an idea that a particular regulation contained something which was not very good and wanted to raise the matter. I would have to go on a pilgrimage around the country and try to get a majority of Deputies to sign a motion asking for the recall of the Dáil to discuss it. Most Deputies would not want to come back when the House was in recess; they would be quite happy doing work in their constituencies. Even if they agreed with me they would not want to come back to the Dáil to discuss some niggling point, as they saw it. It is just not practical. If an Opposition Deputy was going around he would have to get a number of Government Deputies to sign something which they would know would inconvenience their Minister and which would cast a reflection on his sense in making the regulation. The protection in section 4 (2) is laughably ineffective. I cannot understand how a party who have prided themselves on being the protectors of Irish sovereignty could bring such a ridiculous proposal before the House.
I believe that we should at least have the provision that a decision as to whether a particular directive will be implemented by means of regulation or of legislation shall be taken from the Government and handed over to a committee of the House who will decide whether a particular matter is sufficiently important to warrant legislation, which will allow for a complete full-dress debate, or merely for implementation by regulation. If it is decided that it is to be done by regulation the existing procedure should apply, whereby if any one Deputy wishes he can have the matter raised within 21 days and he is given an hour in which to have it discussed. Even that is inadequate because one has to be prepared to have the regulation annulled completely in order to have it raised. One must have a motion to the effect that it be annulled. It should be sufficient for a Deputy to be prepared to put down a motion seeking to amend a regulation in a particular respect to get him an open discussion on the regulation.
It is quite possible within the Community regulations and within the spirit of the EEC to have a much greater role for this House in the legislative process of the Community. I have made a number of proposals whereby this can be done. I hope the Government will listen to them. I cannot understand why the Government have sought to restrict debate on European legislation in this House to so great an extent.
Can the Minister tell me by what criteria it is decided at the Council of Ministers or at the Commission or wherever it is decided, whether a proposed measure will be implemented by a directive, which gives considerable leeway to the national Government in regard to implementation, or by a regulation which puts the matter directly into effect in the countries concerned? I understand, for instance, that the Community had before it last March four proposals in regard to farm reform; three of them were in the form of directives and the other one in the form of a regulation. The three in the form of directives were: one in regard to retirement pensions for farmers, one in regard to a farm modernisation scheme, which is similar to the small farm incentive bonus scheme, and one in regard to socioeconomic advice and training for farmers. The other proposal was in regard to producer groups. For some reason, the Community decided that the first three should be in the form of directives while the fourth one, which was equally important as far as I could see, should be merely in the form of a regulation which would be directly applicable and which Governments would not have an opportunity of varying or interpreting in regard to its implementation. What criteria are used in deciding whether particular proposals shall be implemented by means of a directive or by means of a regulation? Are there any fixed criteria of which this House could have knowledge or is it purely a matter of administrative convenience for the Commission? If it is, there is something at fault.
Is it possible for the Council of Ministers to make a decision on a particular matter without a draft proposal having been published in the Journal Officiel prior to that decision? Is there a provision whereby it must have been published in the Journal Officiel a certain reasonably long period prior to the decision being taken to give an opportunity for views to be expressed, or is it possible for the Council of Ministers simply to decide in the middle of a session that it is desirable that a decision should be made on an issue, that it can make that decision and that can become binding without a draft of the decision having been published in the Journal Officiel prior to the decision? It is essential that every decision taken by the Council of Ministers should be on the basis of and in relation to the subject matter of a proposal which has been published a reasonable time in advance in the Journal Officiel, thereby giving an opportunity to this Parliament and other Parliaments, and interested groups concerned, to express their views to the Ministers prior to the decision being taken. Perhaps this is an unreal difficulty; perhaps it never happens that decisions are taken other than by this procedure.
I think this is also important. I should like to know more in regard to what Deputy de Valera spoke about, the democratic voice expressed through the Council of Ministers. I can see that a decision by the Ministers on a proposal by the Commission has a significantly greater democratic content than a simple decision by the Commission itself without reference to the Ministers because the Commission are not elected by anybody, whereas the Council are Ministers of elected Governments. I should like to know by what criteria it is decided that a particular EEC regulation shall take effect by a unilateral regulation being made by the Commission without reference to the Council and in what circumstances is it necessary that that regulation should go through the procedure of being published in the Journal Officiel, be submitted to and decided by the Council thus giving an opportunity for discussion.
I know that draft directives and regulations are published in the Journal Officiel which affords an opportunity for their discussion but I am told that by the time a proposal is actually published the Commission have more or less made up their minds on it, that the matter has been examined in great depth, and that what has emerged is effectively very near to a compromise between the interests of the various states. Is there such a thing as a working document which could be published and which exists at a much earlier stage in the decision-making process at which stage, perhaps, the delicately-balanced compromise has not been reached which is finally expressed in the published document in the Journal Officiel? If that is the case and if there is a working document giving some inkling of what is proposed and if it is in any way published, that also should be laid before the House by means of the procedure to which I referred earlier so as to give the House an opportunity to express itself on the, shall we say, raw proposal and not on the finely-balanced compromise which emerges in the form of a published draft directive in the Journal Officiel. Clearly, if it is a finely-balanced proposal which is finally published it will be much more difficult to upset and, therefore, the discussion in this House will be much less meaningful than it would be if we were discussing a raw proposal where there was great possibility of change. I ask the Minister to ensure that when the debate for which I am hoping on draft regulations does take place in this House any working documents which might lead to draft directives should also be drawn to the attention of the House and Members given an opportunity to express themselves on those also.
In the Bill before us we have a long list of regulations, decisions and directives. I should like to know how these regulations will be brought into effect. Have the Government decided that the Bill in itself will do this? Section 2 states:
From the 1st day of January, 1973, the treaties governing the European Communities and the acts adopted by the institutions of those Communities shall be binding on the State and shall be part of the domestic law thereof under the conditions laid down in those treaties.
Does that mean that everything we have here in this long explanatory memorandum with its lists of regulations shall be directly applicable in this State from the passage of this Bill? Or does it mean that when this Bill is passed the Government will have to make regulations implementing each one of these proposals? Or does it mean that the Government will not have to make regulations implementing what are described as regulations but that additional regulations will have to be laid before the House in the normal way implementing the directives? Have the Government decided that some of these directives shall, in fact, be again brought before the House even though they are in this explanatory memorandum in the form of actual legislation?
May I draw the Minister's attention to the proposals on farm modernisation which I have already mentioned? These are already the subject of great debate in the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and people are not sure what they mean precisely. I think there is a case that these proposals should not become effective simply by passing section 2 of this Bill and that they should be again brought before the House in the form of legislation which would actually implement them. I should like an assurance from the Minister that these proposals will, as far as possible, again come before the House in some cases as regulations and in others as actual legislation so that they can be discussed in detail.
Clearly, we are not discussing all these proposals at present and yet, on the face of it, we appear to be putting them into effect. What we are discussing are the broad principles of Community decision-making but not detailed regulations. These detailed regulations require to be discussed and I think a separate opportunity must be provided for their discussion.
I am not a practising lawyer and do not know much about interpretation of statutes but it seems to me there will be a certain problem of interpretation. We have a list here of Irish Acts which will be affected by Community law. We are told in regard to the Restrictive Trade Practices Acts, 1953 and 1959—to take an example which may not, in fact, illustrate my point— that Community provisions will affect the following: provisions relating to the carrying out of investigations into practices which have as their object the prevention, restriction or distortion of competition. Will there be difficulty in interpreting precisely where the Community legislation stops in effect and where you must revert to Irish legislation to find what is the law on a particular subject? Unless each one of these statutes is specifically amended to delineate precisely the extent to which the Community law changes existing Irish statutes you will have the possibility of differences of opinion as to whether a Community provision applies in a particular area or whether it is just the Irish law.
Is it possible that this difficulty could be overcome by specifically amending these Acts to the extent that they are changed by Community regulations? Clearly, it will be very difficult for lawyers to decide, if you have two bodies of law both operative in the country at the same time, where one stops and the other begins. Again, I would emphasise that I am speaking as somebody not practising law and, perhaps, that is not a real difficulty. I suppose that if it is a difficulty it has been discovered already in the Community countries. I should like to know how the Minister proposes to get over that difficulty.
That is really all I want to say except to ask the Minister to find some very significant improvement on the provisions expressed in this Bill for consultation with the House in regard not only to existing EEC decisions but also, more importantly, in regard to draft EEC decisions. It will strengthen the hand of those Irish Ministers who are on the Council of Ministers to have the view of their own Parliament behind them, to hear aspects explored which they or their civil servants and advisers might not advert to but which Members of the House who are directly in touch with the people would advert to. I would ask the Minister to convey to the Government the need greatly to improve the provision for democratic participation through this House in Community decision-making.