First of all, I would like to thank Catherine and Ruairi for their kind welcome to today’s event.
I also want to congratulate Michael and everyone at the IIEA for putting together an exceptional week of events to mark 30 years of what is unquestionably Ireland’s leading think tank.
This week’s events are a great tribute to your work but also to the memory of the Institute’s founder and guiding light Brendan Halligan.
Throughout his long and impressive involvement in party politics Brendan was always passionate and would never have wanted to be called ecumenical.
However, in this Institute he founded something which is still unique in Ireland – a place dedicated to reaching across party divides through rigorous research and challenging debate.
The IIEA stands out in a country where too many policy debates go straight to the political fight without seeking perspective and reflection. And critically, it has provided an essential forum for engaging with fundamental challenges in European and wider international affairs.
The Institute’s work on climate, energy, security, trade and other areas is vital for our country. At a moment in world history where populism and disinformation have become deeply corrosive, we need expert and independent forums for exploring and debating critical issues.
After thirty years there is no doubt that the IIEA is not only still relevant, it is more important than ever and there is much to be learned from its approach.
Let’s reflect on the past but shape the future
The Institute was founded during a dramatic period of development in the role and ambition of what was becoming the European Union.
Under the visionary leadership of Jacques Delors, a new agenda was developed to reinvigorate Europe. It was understood that something had to be done to renew a model of cooperation which too often was leading to deadlock. Equally, Europe was failing to fulfil anywhere near its potential for shared progress and development.
For Ireland the way forward at that time was absolutely clear. We needed the Single Market to be more complete to enable us to trade and attract investment. In the same way Economic and Monetary Union was an opportunity to secure our place and influence within a much larger economic context.
And of course, the cohesion agenda would enable us to build a knowledge-intensive economy and begin the rapid development of our infrastructure.
The decisions we took at that time – the faith which we reaffirmed in our European future – opened up a new era of development for Ireland.
I am absolutely clear in saying our country faces serious challenges today which it must overcome however no one can argue against the fact that our country has achieved real and sustained progress because of the reforms of the European Union which we supported thirty years ago.
When Seán Lemass put our country on course for membership of what is today the European Union he understood very well the risks that were involved. As far back as the 1920s he had read discussions about how a Europe united in a strong multinational organisation was needed for peace and prosperity. And part of this was the concern that Ireland was just too poor and too peripheral to participate.
However, he believed that this concern was wrong – that Ireland could change the path of its history.
Lemass, who began his public career as a teenager fighting in the Rising, ended it fifty years later pushing for Ireland to join the great cause of European cooperation.
And so, it was that Ireland’s European story became unique in a very important way. We are similar to many other states in that we were founded by nationalist revolutionaries after the First World War. But we are different in that these same revolutionaries went on to seek to secure the benefits of this independence through participation in a strong, rules-based community of European nations.
The key events of our membership of the European Union are well known. So too is an undeniable fact – had we not joined the Union we would be a significantly poorer, more isolated and more divided country.
The Union is the greatest enabler of peace and progress in the history of Europe. But talking about past achievements is not enough when the Union is facing rising and unprecedented challenges.
And in Ireland this means we have to understand that we are right to celebrate the historic progress of the last fifty years – but our primary focus has to be on shaping the future.
We cannot assume that attitudes and policies developed to meet the challenges of previous decades are still relevant.
Our progress in the European Union was based on being willing to look at hard realities, take risks and embrace new approaches.
We did this when we decided to join.
We did this when we supported the Single Market and the Euro.
We did this when we championed the expansion of the Union.
And I believe we must again renew our approach as both Ireland and Europe seek to meet new challenges and address clear gaps in the workings of our shared Union.
The process of renewing and reforming the Union needs an urgency and ambition which Ireland must help to shape.
The last decade and a half has been turbulent for the Europe Union. The Great Recession exposed weaknesses in its structure and rising forces of destructive nationalism have confronted it.
The question for us is will we play our role in helping the Union to regain its confidence and to show a new energy?
Our guiding principle must be a simple one: A successful Ireland needs a successful European Union.
And the truth is that events of recent years have shown that we cannot take this success for granted.
I believe we need a renewed urgency in our approach to Europe and to move onto a more active agenda.
I want to address this by looking at four specific dimensions of how we can this. Specifically;
Expanding the EU’s role,
Protecting the EU’s core principles,
Enabling a new relationship with the United Kingdom, and
Being more active on EU matters in our own national politics.
Expanding the EU’s role
Last week the Government launched a programme of engagement with the Conference on the Future of Europe. Underpinning this is our support of the idea that we must have an honest and inclusive discussion about where the Union goes to from here.
Minister Thomas Byrne is leading this process and every member of government will be engaged with it. I would strongly urge everyone with views on the future of Europe and Ireland’s role within it to participate in the consultations.
For many years one of the great problems faced by the Union is that people have placed expectations on it without giving it the resources or laws to achieve them.
The Union itself has also often fallen for the trap of what psychologists’ call ‘the law of the instrument’ which is – “when all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail”.
And in the specific context of the Union this has led to a focus on a very limited range of economic and fiscal controls.
This is why so often we have a very narrow debate. We saw this in the early years of the financial crisis when the entire focus was on a very inflexible approach. The dramatic policy changes of 2011 and 2012 were only reached when every other approach had failed.
I believe that one of the biggest changes we need to make is to restore the position of the European Union as a direct enabler of growth. Part of this is the need for a larger fiscal capacity.
This is why last year, with the support of the government, I put forward a position at the European Council which was strongly in favour of expanding the EU’s Budget as well as creating a special Covid-recovery fund. This was in spite of the fact that Ireland is now a net contributor to the Union.
When it comes to helping countries and regions to develop or to get through an economic shock, we need the Union to do more. Equally we need it to have greater resources to help us all overcome critical challenges.
We need the Union to be the enabler of much more aggressive innovation in tackling climate change and delivering energy security. This is an existential crisis which no one country can overcome by itself. Only by unleashing the full potential of researchers and innovators throughout Europe can we step-change outcomes.
I believe that the terrible pandemic which we have experienced over the past 14 months has again shown how countries need each other. And I believe that the case for significantly increasing the public health competencies of the European Union is stronger than is has ever been.
A stronger European Centre for Disease Control is needed as an essential guidance for countries in reacting rapidly to developments and guiding critical common decisions. We have to make the decision-making procedures faster and more comprehensive.
While there have been many adverse comments, the fact is that cooperation on vaccine ordering and manufacturing has a tremendous success for the European Union. It has demonstrated solidarity and saved lives within Europe and the world.
Already 200 million doses of European-manufactured vaccines have been administered in Europe – and 200 million doses of European-manufactured vaccines have been administered in the rest of the world.
Ireland and nearly every other European country could have had no guarantee of access to these vaccines outside of the EU-led cooperation.
And let’s not miss the fact that no other major vaccine producer in the world has exported significant number of vaccines. The UK and US have exported almost nothing in comparasion. Others have exported minor amounts and often with geopolitics rather than public health as the main focus.
There’s no doubt that at times the EU has not been the most effective communicator on this matter – but it is substance not spin that matters. We have every right to be proud of and thankful to the EU for its work in fighting the virus and distributing the vaccines which are helping us to restore hope.
Public health challenges are likely to be just as difficult in the future, and an EU with a greater leadership role in this field and the required resources is vital.
In looking for ways of expanding the role and capacities of the Union we need to be careful of ideas which are not soundly-based.
I very much support the idea of the EU developing greater strategic autonomy. However, we have to be careful as we move forward towards determining what this means in practice.
True European champions will come from supporting innovation rather than artificial controls or preferences. Wherever you look in the world the models which offer us the biggest opportunity have been based on active promoting of cutting-research, a positive approach to start-ups and a consistent investment in skills.
The wonderful example of BioNTech is one which shows us the way forward.
A company founded by researchers from an immigrant background, BioNTech received direct funding, research funding and subsidised loans from EU and national schemes.
The Comirnaty vaccine which they developed with this assistance is a triumph of modern science and it is the most important vaccine helping Ireland and others to get through this pandemic.
That is exactly the type of European champion we need more of.
Last week EU leaders took an important decision at our Social Summit in Porto to reinforce our collective commitment to the social dimension of the Union.
The Porto Declaration makes clear that our shared European ideal is first and foremost about improving the lives of our citizens, guided by the political compass of our Social Pillar.
It makes clear that the European Union, as a community of values, is much more than simply a marketplace.
The concrete employment, skills and poverty-reduction targets to be achieved by 2030 provide the right political emphasis for underpinning a strong and sustainable post-pandemic recovery.
This means a recovery that is deeply rooted in equipping men, women, young, old, people with disabilities, those rural and urban, people with the skills and capabilities for full participation in economic and social life.
It marks an important milestone in setting a progressive EU agenda for the decade ahead.
I believe that a European Union empowered with greater resources and critical new competencies in areas such as public health and climate change can ensure that Europe remains a strong, dynamic and prosperous community of nations.
Protecting the EU’s core principles
However, we must also understand that there is work to be done to protect the core principles which underpin the European Union.
Both within the Union and internationally, there are forces which oppose the idea of countries being subject to agreed rules including the protection of democracy and human rights.
In the last century the European Union ended centuries of conflict and division on the basis of states agreeing shared values.
These can no longer be taken for granted.
Where once people talked of the triumph of liberal democracy, in recent years people have begun to write about the retreat of democracy.
The brilliant and provocative political scientist Ivan Krastev, a man profoundly committed to democratic ideals, has gone as far as to ask if we have gone from ‘The End of History’ to “The End of Europe”.
Ireland cannot stand on the side-lines. We are a democratic republic. Our constitution commits us to the ideal of international cooperation and asserts our support for the principles enshrined in the European treaties.
We must work with others who share these beliefs.
I strongly support the new commitment to multilateralism and democracy which we have discussed with President Joe Biden. Just as he is bringing a new beginning to the relationship of the United States with the wider world, we must work with him and with each other in the cause of defending democracy.
Enabling a New relationship with the UK
Last Friday I stressed to Prime Minister Johnson how Ireland wants to help rebuild a constructive and sustainable relationship between the European Union and the United Kingdom
The referendum, together with the decades of anti-EU rhetoric which preceded it and the drawn-out negotiations which followed, caused damage which cannot be undone.
As I have said many times before, Brexit is a major step-backwards and there is no upside to it. However, it is now a reality and we must do whatever we can to limit the scale of its negative impact.
The Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the EU and the UK, taken together with the Withdrawal Agreement, including the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland, represent the best possible outcome in the circumstances.
There is no useful purpose served in keeping the debate about Brexit going. If we want what is best for us all then we need to retire this dispute and focus on the full and effective implementation of what has been agreed.
We need good faith and cooperation – and we need to understand that the first reflex when there is a problem should be to seek engagement not to promote a dispute.
It should, however, be acknowledged that this relationship can never be the same as the relationship between EU Member States, however hard we work on making it the best it can be.
Tomorrow you will hear from both Bertie Ahern and Tony Blair – in a reminder of just how much can be achieved by the Dublin and London governments when they work together closely.
What they achieved together for our countries was and remains historic – and that was a partnership which they insisted was reflected in every part of their governments. I particularly remember how it was agreed that disputes, of which there were many, were to be dealt with in a spirit of open discussion and good faith.
The absence of the joint context of the European Union is a major challenge and one which we are working to address.
In addition to the economic consequences and the implications for Northern Ireland, with the UK’s departure, Ireland has lost an important partner in the EU, with whom we collaborated on many issues. The need for Ireland to build alliances with Member States across the EU has never been more evident.
We have strengthened across the Union in order to broaden and deepen our contacts with partners. This includes a new approach to engaging with countries of different sizes and with different priorities.
EU Issues in Irish Politics
Fundamentally we are in a period where the future direction and success of the European Union is at stake.
We need to be honest and admit that we have often failed to treat EU issues with urgency within our politics. Given just how central a successful EU is to prosperity and progress in our country this has to change.
Those of us who believe in the ideals of the Union have to be aware that Euroscepticism is a very real part Irish politics but it is too rarely confronted. In country after country we can see what happens when anti-EU sentiment is allowed to go unchallenged.
A significant proportion of our representation in the European Parliament constantly attacks the Union as an elite conspiracy against the people. Parties who opposed Irish membership of the Union, who fought against every treaty change and blame the Union for everything have an agenda which is shared with anti-EU parties throughout Europe.
The greatest mistake made in the UK was the casual assumption that there was only so far, the anti-EU forces would go – and that economic reality would always stand in their way.
The basic Eurosceptic populism which drove the anti-EU campaign was ignored for too long and not enough was done to challenge them.
We can’t make that mistake here just because we are in a period where public appreciation of the EU is very high. We have to make our case of how central the EU is not just to our past development, but to our future progress.
We have to call out those who promote populist attacks on the Union but pretend that they aren’t actually anti-EU.
And we have to make public engagement on EU matters a permanent part of how we talk about issues.
Part of this is that we have to help the public to separate the signal from the noise.
This can only be done through investing in transparent, evidence-based discussion. And often this is about mapping out not just the grey area but the rainbow of opinion that legitimately sit between black and white on complex EU issues.
Because the price of misinformation and disinformation, and reductivist debates are incredibly high.
Just last week I participated in the latest Christchurch Call, a movement set up by Prime Minister of New Zealand Jacinda Ardern and President Emmanuel Macron in the wake of the terrorist attacks on two mosques in New Zealand. The immediate focus of the Call is to remove violent extremist and terrorist content, but the longer-term work is for a free, open and secure internet not one awash with automated misinformation that leads to radicalisation and incitement to violence in the first place and built with algorithms that narrow opinions and lead people into cul-de-sac worldviews.
And that is why investing in informed and transparent public discourse will remain a priority for me, whether that it through the Citizens Assemblies, the dialogues of the Shared Island Initiative or over the coming period through Conference on the Future of Europe events.
Conclusion
After a period where people began to question the very foundations of the European Union, self-confidence is beginning to return. This brings with it an opportunity to reshape our future direction – an opportunity which we cannot afford to squander.
Ireland’s membership of the European Union has been an incredibly positive chapter in our history. However, this must evolve – we must understand that the challenges of today are very different those we faced in the past.
We need to help the Union to develop new competencies to focus on the critical needs of Europe today – and to ensure that it has resources to make a difference.
We have to be active in defending the principles of multilateral cooperation and the values of democracy when they are facing increasing threats.
We have to help rebuild the critical relationship with the United Kingdom which has been so profoundly changed in recent years.
And we have to understand that Europe is to important to be an afterthought in our politics – it has to gain a greater prominence and we need ongoing engagement with the people.
The EU is a remarkable example of how peace and prosperity can be won through cooperation.
It helped Europe to rebuild after a catastrophic series of conflicts – and it helped to unite states on the basis of shared interests and values.
Over nearly fifty years of membership Ireland has changed dramatically – and equally the European Union has changed dramatically. There have been key moments when fundamental decisions have been required in order to renew and energise the Union.
This is another one of those moments and it falls to Ireland to speak up and work for a European Union which preserves its values and builds on its great achievements.