The two Green Party Ministers actively lobbied Taoiseach Brian Cowen in favour of Pat Cox’s appointment as EU Commissioner but were persuaded to support Maire Geoghegan-Quinn on condition that a Green would be appointed to her cabinet, former senator Déirdre De Búrca has insisted.
In a detailed statement today Ms De Búrca, who is still a member of the Greens, said she wanted to put the record straight abut a number of inaccurate claims that had been made since her resignation from the Seanad last Friday.
She said one of the inaccurate claims that had been made about her was that the Greens had only agreed to lobby on here behalf with the Taoiseach in relation to a position in Ms Geoghegan-Quinn’s cabinet.
“In fact, John Gormley told me clearly that he had negotiated a position for a Green in her new cabinet as a basic condition of Green Party support for her nomination. The Green Party had favoured Pat Cox for the position of Commissioner, and the two Green Ministers actively lobbied Brian Cowen to have him nominated for the post.
“However, Fianna Fáil was insistent that one of their own be nominated, and favoured Maire Geoghegan-Quinn. The Green Party eventually agreed to support her nomination subject to the condition that there be a position for a Green in her cabinet,” said Ms De Búrca.
She added that she had queried John Gormley at the time as to whether this was not a decision that the new commissioner-designate herself would have to make.
“John told me that Brian Cowen had telephoned Maire Geoghegan-Quinn last November and made her aware of this condition before she was officially nominated. I asked how she had reacted to the news and he told me that she had agreed because she was very interested in the nomination.
“This occurred last November and while there were obvious sensitivities about discussing the matter publicly before the Commissioner was appointed, there was no uncertainty about it. Any suggestion therefore that my party had merely agreed to lobby Brian Cowen for me in relation to the position is very misleading.”
Ms De Búrca added that the news that the Research and Innovation portfolio had been assigned to the Irish Commissioner was very welcome to her as the portfolio will be critical in assisting the EU achieving its most important strategic objective of becoming an internationally-competitive, low-carbon economy based on innovation in many new areas of green enterprise and technology.
She added that a Green presence in that cabinet would have been valuable and Mr Gormley’s early insistence on having a Green in the cabinet seemed a very sensible one.
“It is indicative of the weakness of the Green Party’s position in government at present that, given the opportunity to influence the momentum in the EU towards a greener low-carbon European economy, my party allowed itself to be ‘shafted’ (to quote John Gormley). It indicates a particular attitude towards green policies that became very familiar in dealing with our government partners in Leinster House.
“I regret that John Gormley seems willing to allow the party to be so regularly outmanoeuvred in this way in the interests of remaining in government, rather than asserting the interests of the Green Party and its constituency,” she said.
Ms De Búrca said the past few weeks leading up to her resignation had been extremely difficult ones for her. Three weeks ago a senior Fianna Fáil Minister had stopped her on the corridors of Government Buildings to tell her that the position in Maire Geoghegan-Quinn’s cabinet had been offered to another individual.
“This was the first indication I had that the position was not going to be offered to me. I immediately spoke to John Gormley but it took a further week to confirm that the agreement had been breached by our government partners.
“I encouraged him to insist on the agreement being honoured but he told me that he was powerless to do so. “He told me that our government partners were willing to offer me a position as chef de cabinet in the European Court of Auditors.
“I turned the position down on the basis that I do not believe I have the necessary skills or experience to carry out the important work of ensuring that the EU Budget is correctly implemented,” she said.