The European Commission may have lost some of the swagger it enjoyed during the halcyon days of Mr Jacques Delors, but on the basis of its draft submission to this year's Inter Governmental Conference (IGC), it has lost little of its verve and ambition. As the European correspondent of this newspaper has observed, the Commission is clearly intent on turning the IGC on the reform of the EU into a "major platform" for greater integration and a federal Europe. The agenda being pushed by the Commission could hardly be more audacious and, in some quarters, more provocative. It is pushing for a substantial extension of majority voting in the Council of Ministers, and an effective pooling of sovereignty across a broad range of highly sensitive issues such as foreign policy and immigration; it wants to remove the automatic right of member states to nominate their own Commissioner and, treading on the toes of neutral countries like Ireland, it looks forward to the eventual merger of the EU with the Western European Union (WEU), the European pillar of NATO.
In many respects, the Commission document is a logical response to the various challenges which the EU needs to address in the IGC. There is a clear need to streamline the EU's decision making processes, already slow and cumbersome, before the next phase of enlargement. There is a clear need to ensure that an economic powerhouse like the EU finally begins to punch its weight in international relations - the manner in which the EU failed to exert real influence in the Bosnian quagmire should serve as a salutary lesson. There is a clear need for the member states to acknowledge that "Europe does not have the means to match its ambitions", as the Commission starkly puts it in its draft document.
It is important to acknowledge, however, that the Commission document is at this stage an early draft which may be extensively modified in the course of negotiations with member states and indeed within the Commission itself. The unequivocal opposition of the British government to what will be seen as a federalist agenda can already be taken for granted.
For its part, the Government will be concerned about several aspects of the Commission's plans. The case for more qualified majority voting within the Council may be strong on the basis of efficiency. But there may be a danger that this could make it easier for larger states to assemble a majority against the smaller ones like Ireland.
The Government will also be alarmed about the proposal which could deny member states the automatic right to have their own Commissioner at the Commission table. There is obvious concern that other Commissioners would not have an understanding of the Irish perspective and that the Irish interest would be undermined. That said, there will be those who will argue that it should be no part of the job of a European Commissioner to represent the partisan interest of one member state. The debate on these and other issues which will test Ireland's commitment to European ideals has now begun in earnest with the Commission's draft document.
It is to be hoped that the Government will clarify its position on the range of issues raised by the Commission in the forthcoming White Paper on foreign policy.