Haughey warned Major against giving European Parliament extra powers

Taoiseach Charles Haughey was adamantly opposed to giving the European Parliament any additional powers 30 years ago.

In a June 1991 meeting between Haughey and Major during an EU summit in Luxembourg, the prime minister asked for his views on extending power to the parliament.

“Give them nothing,” Haughey said. “During the [Irish] presidency [in 1990], the biggest impediment to getting things through was the European Parliament.”

Major said he agreed very much but then asked how the council would meet the parliament’s demands for more power.

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“Give them something limited,” Haughey advised. “For example, we could agree to the proposed new method for the appointment of the commission.”

Major said the council could also make the European Commission more financially accountable to the European Parliament and do something to give them a role regarding implementation.

Major asked Haughey for his views on co-decision between the parliament and commission.

“I am totally against it. It would bring the Community to a halt,” Haughey said.

Major said: “Yes I agree. That is excellent.”

Mr Haughey said his MEPs had taken him out to lunch in a good restaurant in Strasbourg. “I told them, ‘I am not giving you one extra power’. Of course we can dress it up a bit.”

He said French president François Mitterrand had no respect for the European Parliament.

The document forms part of confidential papers from the Department of An Taoiseach from 1991 to 1998, which have been transferred to the National Archive and will be available for public viewing from January.

The meeting between both leaders also discussed the Western European Union (WEU), which was a European defence organisation. Haughey said that if the European Community were to have a role in the WEU, Ireland would need a referendum.

Prescient Major

Major, in comments that were prescient given what happened with Brexit 25 years later, said there was some talk of a referendum relating to the European Community in Britain.

“That is not our system. We had a referendum once only – in 1975 – when the government was deeply divided on remaining in the community and indeed the majority were against it,” he said

In another prescient comment, Major also told Haughey that he was worried about the introduction of a single currency in Europe. He said it would create unemployment in the UK but “it would do much worse in Spain and Greece”.

Recalling his own difficulties and struggles as a young man, he said: “For my part I loathe unemployment. I am the first prime minister ever who has been unemployed, and for a substantial period, and I know what it is like.

“The problem [with the single currency] is that it’s like a piece of elastic which is already greatly stretched. There is a danger that if you stretch it too far, it will break …

“We have to consider the danger that the community will come to seem like a rich man’s club,” he said, arguing it would leave the community less open to emerging democracies in eastern Europe.

The taoiseach, who favoured a single currency, replied that sometimes it was worth taking a risk: “You have to remember the Roman Centurion. He would throw the standard into the ranks of the enemy and dare his troops to follow. You’ve got to throw your ambition far enough ahead if you want to succeed,” he said. (Archive ref: 2021/1/314)