WITH only three months to go before Ireland assumes the EU presidency, the Government has nailed its colours firmly to the staff of mainstream European integrationism. But it warns that the Union must do more to address the day to day concerns of citizens on issues such as jobs and crime.
Not for Ireland the British emphasis on "intergovernmentalism" the opposite of federalism and the national veto, or a project limited to the creation of a vast free market of 370 million. Rather the Government envisages an "ever closer Union among the peoples of Europe", a federalising project in which wealth and elements of sovereignty are shared between interdependent, mutually trusting nations.
Hence the White Paper shows New support for the extension of qualified majority voting, "for extra powers for the European Parliament, and for bringing more sensitive justice issues under the ambit of Community" decision making.
. A strong commitment to qualifying for the single currency. And the paper supports putting new competences into the treaty in areas such as employment, the environment, the rights of the disabled and social exclusion.
. Opposition to an A Ia carte Europe and the British Social Chapter opt out, to any dilution of the commitment to cohesion between the member states or of the core common policies such ash CAP, and to any treaty definition of "subsidiarity" which dilutes Commission competences.
The White Paper places firmly on the record how much Ireland has benefited from membership in financial terms when transfers for 1995 have been completed total net transfers of some £18.4 billion will have been made from tile EU since accession. The result has been the rise since 1980 of per capita GDP from 62 per cent of the EC average to 89 per cent by the end of this year.
In 1996 alone the CAP will represent payments of £1.2 billion to Ireland on gross receipts of £2.4 billion, and economists put the annual net contribution to the Irish budget from the EU at between 3 and 4 per cent of GDP.
The White Paper goes beyond a statement simply of Ireland's pragmatic interests as a small, relatively poor state and open economy to present for the first time a broaded vision of the sort of Europe this State aspires to, a vision broadly shared by the mainstream of European politics.
It is a Europe in which elements of sovereignty are increasingly pooled, in which it is fundamental that the advantages of the single market are shared "equitably" with the poorer members, a social Europe, a citizen's Europe, where its political weight and responsibility on world stage match its economic power.
The paper commits Ireland for qualifying for the final stage of monetary union, but warns that it would be better for Ireland Britain joined, too.
On the institutional challenge's facing the treaty changing Inter Governmental Conference (IG), much of whose work the Government will steer, the paper makes clear strong support for what it calls the "uniqueness of the current institutional balance which represents the Union's most important achievement and resource.
That balance reflects a sensitive weighting of the rights of small and large states, the paper argues, making the case against any loss of the right to nominate a commissioner or, less categorically, changes in the voting strengths in the Council of Ministers to favour the larger countries.
