Lynch went to London to ascertain Britain's policy and progress on EEC

IT was at Dublin's request that the first Jack Lynch Harold Wilson summit was held in December 6, just weeks after Lynch succeeded Sean Lemass as Fianna Fail leader and Taoiseach.

Lynch was comprehensively briefed for the encounter, the main focuses being on Northern Ireland policy and on both governments' then tentative approaches to EEC membership.

To this end, Lynch was given a sequence of questions honed to elicit from the British side the most detailed configuration of the UK's policy and prospects, of EEC entry.

An assumption throughout the file is that the Irish political elite believed that, realistically, Dublin had to wait to see the outcome of the British approach and then - if the result was favourable to the UK clinch Irish membership at the same time.

A number of papers were prepared for Lynch, including a summary of the Irish position. The material therein is, by now, well known - but the paper concluded with a paragraph entitled "Supranational aspects".

Ireland, it stated, had "no reservations" on this score. "The degree to, which the institutions of the EEC are endowed with supranational powers is strictly limited and these have been substantially watered down by the Luxembourg decision of last January which more or less ensures that a majority decision cannot be used to override the vital interest of a member country".

The meeting between Lynch and Wilson took place over lunch at 10 Downing Street on December 19th, 1966. What had been billed as a tete a tete meeting turned into something else as Wilson - to the surprise of the Irish - was accompanied by three of his ministers, the Foreign Secretary, George Brown, the president of the Board of Trade, Douglas Jay and the agriculture, minister, Fred Peart. It was a working, lunch, continuing at the table until mid afternoon, until - as the Irish note put it - "all the business had been disposed".

The comprehensive Irish note gives a detailed account of the exchanges and is a great achievement by Hugh McCann, secretary of the Department of External Affairs, who wrote it up from memory. Ken Whitaker, secretary of the Department of Finance, who was also present, needed to offer few corrections or additions when invited.

Prompted by Wilson to give an account of his recent meeting with Gen de Gaulle of France, George Brown indicated that he had first met the French Foreign Minister, Couve de Murville, who had been so aloof and uncommunicative" that Brown suggested "perhaps he was talking to the wrong man".

This prompted a 70 minute, occasionally emotional, meeting between Brown and de Gaulle, whom he found "courteous but not very helpful or oncoming". McCann's report summarises: "Put crudely, the General's line was `What do you want? What is your problem? I have no problem, I am not trying to get into the Common Market'."

De Gaulle's concerns were Britain's relationship with the United States and the special position enjoyed by sterling.

On EEC membership, Harold Wilson's view was that five of the six members were favourable to British entry; that the Commonwealth dimension had eased; and that "the supranational political aspects of the EEC had receded". But questioned by the Taoiseach about a possible timetable for British accession "assuming that the outcome of the forthcoming probings are favourable", Wilson replied that "this is a very big assumption".

But there is an underlying assumption that serious, if tentative, probings would be pursued and that Dublin would be kept informed of progress, both governments being mindful of their overlapping interests - indeed, on one occasion, McCann noted, Brown had described Britain and Ireland "as one".

NORTHERN Ireland was another important topic raised at the meeting. Lynch had been prompted to emphasise that he was "very conscious of the many significant steps" Wilson had undertaken personally to help Anglo Irish relations.

A footnote reminded Lynch of what these steps were the return of Roger Casement's remains; the Free Trade Area Agreement; the return of the 1916 flag; and "the pressure, public and private, brought to bear on the Stormont regime". The footnote added that it would be better not to cite there individually, "particularly as knowledge about the fourth item is imprecise".

In McCann's note of the exchanges on Northern Ireland matters, the Taoiseach stated his intention of pursuing the Lemass approach of functional co operation between North and South. He also intended "insofar as it may be possible" to curb any provocative statements on the North - this was clearly to head off any complaint from Wilson about a recent speech by Brian Lenihan in which the Justice Minister had publicly attacked discrimination in Northern Ireland. Dublin had already been alerted that Wilson was under pressure from the Home Office to complain about the Lenihan speech.

Lynch proceeded to outline a list of desirable reforms in Northern Ireland which amounted to the agenda of the nascent civil rights movement housing, employment and franchise reform and especially the issue of "one man, one vote" in local elections, the absence of which resulted in discrimination against Catholics in housing allocation.

In reply Wilson, who had already mentioned Capt O'Neill's "difficulties, with the Rev Ian Paisley", said O'Neill's position "within his own party and cabinet was none too secure" - an excuse already cited by O'Neill "for not making greater or more rapid progress".

Hugh McCann, who had already advised the Taoiseach's office in the preparations for this encounter to appeal to Wilson's "sense of history", now recorded satisfaction with the outcome of the meeting. "While Mr Wilson made no promises, it seemed clear that he was sympathetic to the Taoiseach's representations in this matter," he wrote.