Introduction
Distinguished Guests Ladies and gentlemen,
Beannachtai na Feile Padraig.
Happy St Patrick’s Day to you all.
I’m delighted to be here with you at such a special time of year for Ireland and the Irish people.
I’m equally delighted to speak in honour of the great Irishman and Mayoman, Paul O’Dwyer.
And to speak on the subject and in the cause of something so close to both our hearts democracy.
Today I’m honoured that George Washington University should bestow on me their ‘Making Democracy Work’ award.
Here in the US and at home in Ireland we have the privilege of perhaps taking our democracy for granted.
It is precisely because we do and can that makes our duty to all those countries all those peoples struggling to achieve and assert their democratic rights all the more urgent and indeed all the more sacred.
Paul O’Dwyer
Democracy was integral to all that Paul O’Dwyer believed in.
Paul was the youngest of eleven O’Dwyers from Bohola a village juts down the road from me in Mayo many of whom made their lives here in the United States.
Paul was passionate about justice, fairness, compassion, human rights.
He was passionate too in the professional and personal pursuit and defence of each of them.
And because he was he made a magnificent contribution to public affairs and the law here in America.
With us today as we honour that contribution is Paul O’Dwyer’s son Brian and his wife Marianna.
It is clear that Brian is a proud carrier of the democratic torch passed to him by his father.
He is equally, a great friend to Ireland and a wonderful advocate of our cause here in the US.
Europe
As a proud Irishman as a proud European and as Taoiseach of a still-young Republic democracy and all it implies and inspires drives everything I do.
Because I know that when a democrat gives a politician the most powerful weapon they possess their vote.
It is an almost-sacred exchange of trust and hope and confidence with vast transformative powers.
Today, in Ireland we are using those powers to transform our economy our public service and the structures of the political system itself.
Today, in Europe we must take those powers and evangelise re-evangelise on the very WHY of our European Union.
We must use our democratic zeal to restore our citizens’ trust and confidence not alone in national parliaments but in the political and social ideals of our Union that stretches now from the Atlantic to the Urals.
Right now people across our European Union are hurting.
They are asking their politicians their leaders for help.
In the economic crisis the deepest hurt is that of unemployment.
Facing a day with no work to go to.
Particularly for our young people. Their confidence corroded.
But far worse and more damaging their hopes eroded.
No unemployment figure is acceptable.
But the unemployment figure amongst our young people is intolerable.
We cannot and must not accept such damage to our young men and women.
We cannot and will not commit them to being haunted by the life they could have lived.
As I told the European Parliament in January as democrats we cannot and will not allow a generation to grow up believing that democracy itself has failed to give them a reasonable chance in life.
That is why in Ireland’s Presidency of the EU we are moving with all alacrity to push our urgent agenda of stability, jobs and growth.
For the benefit of Ireland and the benefit of all the peoples of our Union.
We extend that goodwill to the world.
Particularly to our good friend and sister republic the United States of America.
EU/US
The fact is the EU and the US enjoy the most integrated economic relationship in the world.
Our economies account for about half the entire world GDP.
And for nearly one-third of world, trade-flows. EU investment in the US is around eight times that of EU investment in India and China put together.
Total US investment in the EU is three times higher than in all of Asia.
The transatlantic relationship defines the shape of the global economy as a whole.
Either the EU or the US is the largest trade and investment partner for almost all other countries in the global economy.
It is therefore not surprising that releasing the further untapped potential of the EU-US trade relationship is what would provide most benefit in terms of growth and jobs, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Our trade relationship has an enormous potential right now far from being fully exploited.
Currently 15 million jobs depend on EU-US trade.
Just imagine what this number could be if we released the true potential of transatlantic trade!
The bottom-line is that both the EU and the US have a lot at stake and can ill afford to ignore this unique potential for growth.
As more and more production flows from the US and the EU to emerging economies we must face facts. In order to remain competitive in the global economy Europe and the US must innovate.
Long-term evidence shows that the flow of trade and investment help spread new ideas and innovation, new technologies and the best research, leading to improvements in products and services.
So effectively, by investing in the EU-US trade potential, we are not only releasing short to medium-term economic and jobs growth, we are also ensuring the long-term sustainability of our economies’ competitiveness.
So vital for democracy.
Given these enormous benefits, both in the medium and the long-term, I am delighted that a real momentum to advance transatlantic trade is emerging.
Economic recovery
Of course, our national agenda is equally urgent.
When my government came to office, we inherited an economy in tatters, a people in crisis, an Ireland with its reputation in ruins.
Just two years on the news is so much better.
Not because of what the government did alone but because of what as democrats we and the people did together.
In February 2011, the people voted and gave us a resounding mandate to make the difficult decisions and rescue the economy they had worked so hard to build.
Because of their sacrifice their belief and a strong, strategic, uncompromising plan we have made an excellent start on the road to recovery.
After years of chronic contraction our economy is showing promising signs of expansion.
In fact it is entering its third consecutive year of growth. Competitiveness and exports are up.
Prices and costs have fallen back to 2003 levels.
We are continuing our phased and successful return to the bond markets.
International confidence in Ireland has been restored.
During second-half 2012 the numbers at work in the economy rose over a six month period for the first time since 2008.
It’s been difficult but in the context of the mandate we were given we could do no less.
The result is a new and this-time sustainable path to growth.
Crucial was tackling the major challenge of domestic debt- levels. We are taking the proper steps to ensure the long-term stability of our banking sector and public finances.
Equally important was reconfiguring our skills base.
Now we’re ranked number one in the world for the availability of skilled labour.
But economic recovery though vital is never the end in itself.
Rather in-keeping with our democratic ideals it’s what that recovery can do for the people in every aspect of their lives political cultural social and economic.
Peace processAnd that recovery and all its potential follows a hard-won peace.
It’s fair to say that the Troubles in Northern Ireland affected life on our island brutally painfully.
The graffiti of murder and hatred and loss writ large over our tiny island.
Democracy and the pursuit of democratic ideals have been an integral part of winning the peace.
And in that America played its part.Yes the Atlantic divided us but our love for humanity for democracy united us.
And it did so in the form of Senator George Mitchell who so brilliantly yet patiently chaired the talks that led to the Good Friday Agreement.
It did so in the form of President Clinton who refused to give up on the peace he knew ‘would come dropping slow’.
It did so in the form of our many friends democrats all on both sides of the aisle on Capitol Hill.
That peace is as much yours as ours.
We know that America will work to sustain it and renew it and we are pleased that President Obama and his administration have been so available and encouraging.
That peace caters to and for people with different traditions, cultures and aspirations.
It is the responsibility of those of us who have the privilege of holding political office to defend, to underpin, and to reinforce its principles, its values and its institutions.
Our approach to dialogue on the island of Ireland is characterised by openness and respect, which aims to harness and nurture relationships with those within troubled communities who have the will and the ability to work to resolve issues peacefully, using politics to succeed where violence never can.
Positive engagement can build a virtuous cycle of respectful and honest conversations giving community leaders the impetus to carry on when it seems, as it may sometimes do, that the fear and anger are too big, too intractable, to be overcome.
They can be overcome. As co-guarantors of the Good Friday Agreement, the British and Irish Governments are keenly aware of our responsibilities in this regard. It is clear that the vast majority of people in Northern Ireland and elsewhere across these islands, want to see peace and prosperity flourish, and reject the attempts of a tiny minority whose offering is a only a return to the emptiness of terror, bloodshed and murder.
That peace in Northern Ireland meant change it meant having the courage to come to the edge.
Political Change
In Ireland we are undertaking a major change and reform of public services and indeed of our political system itself.
In a letter discovered only a few years ago George Washington wrote. "
The happiness of this country depends much on the Constitutional Convention which is now sitting. It however, can only lay the foundation – the community must raise the edifice."
He was perfectly right. Indeed it is in the community the people that true democratic power lies.
Because even though governments may rule in the end it is the people themselves who govern.
With that in mind, the Irish government has established its own Constitutional Convention.
It will consider a range of matters both social and institutional. Our Programme for Government recognises the need for the Constitution to reflect the new, emerging Ireland and the lives of its people.
The 66 public Convention members have been selected randomly from the electoral register, to help make it broadly representative of society in terms of gender, age, regional balance, etc.
In a time when the gap is growing between the people and politics this is an excellent opportunity for our citizens to become involved in this important innovation in our shared public life.
Through our Constitutional Convention Irish citizens and politicians from both north and south are coming together to discuss constitutional reform a new concept in our country. The Convention’s first recommendations have just been made.
Equally we plan to undertake a major reform of the political system itself.
In our senate and Local Government it’s time for change.
Because if we’re asking people in their homes and businesses and communities all across this country to make big changes to make big sacrifices.
Then, as democrats, we have a political duty a moral duty to take our own medicine.
Politically and morally in the past too often Ireland left its children in a parlous state.
In November last the Irish people went to the polls and made history.
At the stroke of a pen they ensured that for the first time the Constitution of our Republic recognised children as citizens in their own right.
That referendum is just part of a raft of legislation designed to uphold and better uphold the rights and dignity of the children of Ireland.
The extensive time and energy put into making and enforcing the new laws made it clear the priority my government attaches to keeping children safe and families secure.
I am confident that these reforms will be both substantial and sustaining for the next generation.
They show our government to be a reforming a government.
Conclusion
In his oath as First President of the United States. President George Washington spoke of the importance of precedent and that, in turn, these "precedents may be fixed on true principles".
Like America the Republic of Ireland strives to live and work and thrive according to the highest democratic principles.
They are those same principles that inspired and guided Paul O’Dwyer.
The same that guide all of us today in our collective democratic endeavours either side of the great Atlantic.
Ends