There was a demand for greater openness, transparency and accountability in EU decision-making and for leaving what was best done at national or local level to be tackled domestically, the President, Mrs McAleese, said yesterday.
Speaking on "Ireland and the EU: Progress through Partnership" in an address to the School of Law at the University of Lisbon, the President said fears expressed when Ireland joined the EU in 1973 had proved groundless.
These fears had concerned potential marginalisation in a powerful and wealthy EEC; a weak Irish economy and competition for farmers and industry; and Irish culture, neutrality and sovereignty.
"Our once-poor country is now one of the wealthiest in the world. Our small country speaks with a large voice in Europe. Our economic and social transformation runs in parallel with a cultural dynamism and self-confidence which would have been absolutely impossible to imagine back in 1973."
She told an audience of more than 500 on the second day of her state visit to Portugal that the egalitarian partnerships formed with countries large and small - and the realisation that Ireland could contribute as well as benefit from EU membership - had transformed Ireland and instilled a new spirit of self-belief and assertiveness.
Relations with Britain, Mrs McAleese said, had improved dramatically.
The Good Friday agreement could not have been successfully concluded were it not for the new collegial friendship between Ireland and Britain which started and grew in the corridors of Brussels.