Technology may give better knowledge of EU - professor

CHANGES IN the technology of communication could make it easier to develop a knowledge and understanding of the European Union, Prof Farrel Corcoran of Dublin City University told the Subcommittee on Ireland's Future in the EU at Leinster House yesterday.

He said the subcommittee should understand the pressures on RTÉ and other media "to avoid, as they see it, programming that is going to send their budget line shooting downward in an environment where things have got to be protected financially".

Labour TD Joe Costello said there was an "information deficit" in Ireland on the EU. "The information isn't coming through and how could it be coming through?"

Criticising the timing of RTÉ programmes on the broadcasting schedule, he said: "You have to wait till one o'clock in the morning to get Oireachtas Report, which is outrageous. And you have to wait 'til always after 12 to get anything on the EU."

He added: " The Irish Timesis the only paper that actually does, shall we say, a comprehensive job, but then The Irish Timesis fairly highbrow and that's a limited audience. You look into the political page and unless you have time to get buried into it . . . but, at the same time, they do it, they do a lot and they do it on Europe," Mr Costello said.

Protection of the national interest was the basis upon which former taoisigh Sean Lemass and Jack Lynch sought Irish membership of what would later become the European Union, chairman of the Institute of International and European Affairs Brendan Halligan told the subcommittee.

"The treaties are absolutely central to the life of the EU. It is a unique experiment in interdependence and seeing it in any other guise I think is a grievous mistake," he added. "The last treaty at Lisbon was designed to meet the challenges of the 21st century, eg, dealing with climate change, and it was intended to settle the institutional structure of the union for some considerable period."

Prof Richard Sinnott from the School of Politics and International Relations at University College Dublin, speaking on Measures to Improve Public Understanding of the EU and its Fundamental Importance for Ireland's Future, said the No side had an upward curve of 10 per cent in support in the Lisbon referendum, compared to votes on other EU treaties.

Chairman of the IIEA Publications Committee, Anthony Brown said the Lisbon Treaty underlined the importance of public services in the economic and social development of the EU. He said it could be argued "that the Treaty provides a very strong basis of guarantee for the future of public services.