A criticism that Ireland has no strategic policy towards Europe was rejected yesterday at the National Forum on Europe.
Mr Ben Tonra, deputy director of the Dublin European Institute at UCD, directed his criticisms particularly at Irish involvement in the Convention on the Future of Europe. "Regarding team Ireland, it seems we're playing without a game plan, no strategy, with no team building and certainly no manager," he said.
However, his comments were rejected by the Minister of State for European Affairs, Mr Dick Roche, who said he was disappointed and amazed by the inaccuracy of the comments.
Ireland, he said, had had an impact on the Convention, particularly in some of the most difficult working groups. He said he chaired the biggest group of like-minded states in the Convention. He particularly praised the work done by Mr John Bruton and Mr Proinsias de Rossa.
Mr Roche said the Government was fully committed to the Convention process and was fully engaged in its work at all levels.
Mr Tonra said things had got better on the basis of individual performances. However, he had spoken to non-Irish convention members and journalists, who considered there was no sense of a strategic Irish position.
"I think there is a weakness on our part. It is Irish policy towards Europe generally. We've not had an institutionalised, strategic approach to Europe," Mr Tonra said.
At the forum yesterday, Mr Roche and Mr Bruton announced different proposals for the election of the President of the European Commission.
Mr Roche said he had put forward a proposal on behalf of the Government to the Convention that, under the new treaty, the President of the Commission of the EU should be elected by an electoral college representing the national parliaments of the 25 member-states and the European Parliament. The Irish proposal recommended that the electoral colleges would represent on a 50/50 basis the member-state parliaments and the European Parliament.
The aim was for an open and transparent system for electing the Commission President, Mr Roche said.
However, Mr Bruton yesterday proposed another form of election. He said he had proposed the direct election by the people themselves of the President of the Commission. This was necessary to give the EU a human face, to maintain the authority of the Commission, and to give all the citizens of Europe a sense that they could individually and personally influence the direction of European policy at election time, he said.
Mr Bruton said as long as the constitutional financial constraints existed within the EU, and they would endure, there was no risk whatsoever of the EU developing into a "super-state".
The forum also discussed Europe's position on Iraq. The keynote speaker, Mr Quentin Peel, international editor of the Financial Times, said Iraq was going to be a hugely divisive debate for Europe and it would have been much better to have a common foreign policy.
The vice-president of the International European Movement, Mr Alan Dukes, said: "I will never understand why people in this country who oppose the kind of adventurism Bush and Blair engage in have never proposed the alternative.
"If Europe had a common foreign policy to which Blair had to adhere, I think policy would be against war."
The Fine Gael spokesman on foreign affairs, Mr Gay Mitchell TD, said that Irish representatives were not biting the bullet and not coming up with recommendations about the future of the defence and security of Europe.
"We're the most vulnerable state as we're not part of a security alliance. I hope we don't, in our cosiness about our neutrality, end up in the same position as the the US on September 11th," he said.