In a recent interview with Gay Mitchell MEP, we discussed about the impact
of the economic crisis in Europe, the Irish EU membership and the future of our
continent.
Mr. Mitchell strongly believes that Ireland became truly
sovereign the day it joined the EU. “Everyone should think of what it was like
before the country joined the block, when the value Ireland’s currency and
interest rates were set by the British Chancellor of the Exchequer,” he says.
“Our biggest export was people,” he adds. There are 800 thousand people of Irish
descent living in Britain to this day, who left during those years. “We had an
economy which actually provided cheap food for Britain,” he describes.
Mr. Mitchell recalls when he became a member of the Dail (Irish
House of Representatives) in 1981; there were very few descent roads in the
country, no financial services sector and though Ireland had an agricultural
industry, it lacked the food industry that it has now.
Today Ireland has pharmaceutical and information technology
industries which are very big. “We export to the EU more computers for business
use than the USA does,” he says.
Ireland has also a booming tourism industry and the
EU enabled the country to diversify its economy. “We have one Commissioner plus
one Minister at the table in the EU council, on the same basis as Germany and
France,” he explains.
Of course bigger countries have a bigger vote, but
the European way is trying to find consensus and agreement. Still Ireland has a
disproportionate vote regarding its size.
The Secretary General of the EU Commission is Irish (Mrs.
Catherine Day), plus the one before her, as well as the Chief operating officer
of the EU Foreign affairs (Mr. David O’Sullivan). Ireland has recently had the
rotating presidency of the EU Council for 6 months. “When did we ever have that
influence in any international organization,” Mr. Mitchell asks.
He believes that EU membership has changed Irish
society. But additionally it preserved its cultural elements. When Ireland
joined the EU, people supported the view that their language is part of who
they are and wanted to keep it.
So the Irish language became one of the EU official
languages, while all-Irish speaking schools were established in Dublin. “Europe
gave us that” Mr Mitchell explains, when a lot of his generation have lost
their Irish because of the way it was taught in schools.
“In my heart I do not believe that Ireland has seen
its best days yet. The Celtic tiger years were phenomenal for our country, but
our best days are ahead of us,” he states.
Ireland has been in the EU since 1973, yet it is
still not a net contributory to the budget and it won’t become for a number of
years. The country receives a lot of money out of the Common Agricultural Policy.
Each time the Irish ministers boast that they fought
a great fight in Europe, to get this money for Ireland. When things go wrong
they claim that they have to implement laws because “Brussels” requires it.
The EU takes decisions through the Council of
ministers, the European Parliament and under the proposals of the Commission, in
all of which all EU member states are represented.
When there are talks about the economic crisis
people hear the words Troika, the EU, European Central Bank (ECB), and the EU
Commission. But they do not hear how the ECB and the European Commission provided
a lot of the support which member states got.
“We got to stop doing that to ourselves and start
explaining to people what the EU is about. It is not about us getting money and
transfers. I look forward to the day when Ireland is actually a net
contributor, because that will be our membership fee for a very good facility,”
Mr Mitchell explains.
“I spend a lot of time visiting schools, speaking
with trade union groups, NGOs and business people, explaining to them how the
EU works and what it does,” he adds.
In the economic area Europe has to solve the problem
of Eurobonds. “And I think that euro-bonds will come about. If we are going to
have a single banking supervisory mechanism which we will have, it is sensible
to have EU bonds that we can all avail of,” he also says.
The Germans will write the cheque and give the
guarantees for this, so the rest of us we’ll have to get our house in order to
qualify. It is important to make it possible for the Germans to sign the
guarantee. It will save a lot of money and make a big difference.
“I also think that any ESM funding directly from
banks, has to be retrospect. It is only fair to do so, plus our macroeconomic
discipline is measured on our debt being a percentage of our GDP. It is done in
the same basis across the whole of the EU. If on the Greek or the Irish balance
sheets for example, are things that are not on other balance sheets then that
is an unfair comparison. That needs to be resolved,” he explains.
But that is not the only problems that the EU faces
at the moment. Under the crisis there has been a rise of nationalism and
far-right political parties. One of the oldest members which always had a
difficult relationship with the EU, Britain, is holding a referendum on its
membership by the end of 2017.
“I understand Mr Cameron’s dilemma but in Britain it
is difficult to debate the EU, just like it is difficult to debate neutrality
in Ireland. I hope we never find out through some very bad circumstances, that
we really haven’t spent the money that we should on our own defense forces to
protect us,” Mr Mitchell says.
Likewise, Britain in the EU is in a very precarious
situation. Mr Cameron has said that he favors Britain remaining in the single
market, even if the people voted to leave the EU. The rules governing the
single market will be decided by a Commission, a Council and a Parliament, in
which Britain will have no input but whose rules it would be required to
follow. That does not make any sense.
Britain should be leading Europe. They have the
political and the diplomatic skills to do it. And more Europe would actually
suit them better, but they can’t see that.
Another key issue for Europe is the rebirth of the
social market economy. It is not a socialist or a liberal invention, but a
Christian Democrat one. Its ethos is not based on a religious element, but on
four principles: enterprise and social justice rights and responsibilities.
“We just stopped talking about social justice. I am
in politics because of that and the reason why I spend so much time in the
development committee. Anybody can talk to you about it, as a great line to get
elected on. But with every right comes a responsibility. We have a
responsibility for ourselves and to each other, and if you want social justice
you have to encourage enterprise,” Mr Mitchell says.
“If someone gets out of bed and goes to work every
morning then they should be encouraged to do that, because that creates wealth.
And if you can’t go to work part of that wealth should be used to help you,” he
describes.
But when you go to avail of the public services, in
which we put a huge amount of the tax payer’s money, we have to have
accountability. Because there are so many votes in the public service, there
should be some kind of protected entity.
Mr. Mitchell believes that that is the base of a new
type of social market economy launch. We need a rebirth of the social market
economy, because that is what happened at the end of the WW2.
Konrad Adenauer, the first post-War Chancellor of
Germany, said at the time that the European project is about people, not about
money. Business people in Europe need to create an ethical environment in which
to operate.
“I am pro business, because business creates wealth.
But when we create wealth we got to distribute it well, have good public services
and give people a fair opportunity. So all of us who are in the mainstream of
politics, we need to think about this and start talking about social justice,”
Mr. Mitchell explains.
Europe will have elections in May 2014. Mr Mitchell believes that who we send to the
EU Commission and to the EP, matters. “First thing citizens got to do is turn
up and be committed. Also get on to the committees that are relevant to their
country and express what their view of Europe is,” he says.
He brings as example the Irish legal system.
Everyday people see one or two judges reported in the papers for a number of serious offenses. They don’t hear about the other judges. But if they were not there,
we would live in a jungle. The job they do is important.
It is the same with MEPs and TDs. “It is not all
about the ones who are in the media on a particular day. But about the guys who
turn up and do their committee work, network and carry influence, who are
measured, have a descent view of what is good for Ireland for Europe,” he
continues.
Whoever people are going to chose, they should chose
the ones who are going to participate because they will have a real say for 5
years.
Ireland is a country that has always been and still
is in its majority, a pro-European nation. Yet in the last referendum on Lisbon
Treaty, as well as many previous ones, the Irish citizens voted against them.
“I think De Gaul was right. He said that referendums
are funny things, because when you ask people what they think, they do not answer
the question you ask. In elections of that kind you can have people protesting,
because they think they can,” Mr Mitchell notes.
Sometimes in a referendum people vote no, because
they want to punish the government. Not all had to do with Europe during the
referendum. Nevertheless there was a concern about Ireland losing its
Commissioner.
The Oireachteas (The Irish National Parliament) committee
collected evidence and they percolated all these issues, which later they
identified. Then the Irish government went and renegotiated them.
“I like the idea of Ireland and all the small states
having a commissioner. The Germans, the Brits and the French gave up their
second commissioner. But if we get to 35 commissioners, what portfolios will
there be and will we end up having a commissioner for something obscure,” Mr
Mitchell mentions.
Perhaps if the EU had only 20 substantial commission
jobs, with every country having one by strict rotation, potentially that would
be a better way. “People chose the former and for now it is probably right,” he
notes.
If there is ever a huge number of Commissioners,
there may be a question of revisiting, yet this is not being pushed on Ireland
by any party. The Irish people themselves might come to this stage later on,
when this is no longer a concern.
Gay Mitchell believes that his biggest impact in
European politics was in the development of dealing with the 3rd
world. He was recruited by the assistant secretary general of the UN, to advice
her on disaster risk reduction.
Gay Mitchell is an Irish politician and was elected
Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the Dublin constituency, on 11 June
2004.
He is a member of Fine Gael, part of the European People's Party, and a former Teachta Dála
(TD) for the Dublin South–Central
constituency from 1981–2007.
He does not plan to run for this May’s European
elections.You may find more information about his work on his website here.
The second part of the interview will be published on OneEurope.
