MEPs, assemble: Could Ireland's MEPs do more to influence Europe?

THERE ARE FEW obvious benefits to Brexit so far, but Ireland has done well out of it in one respect: extra Members of the European Parliament. The two bonus MEPs assigned to Ireland out of the UK’s allocation – more than any other small or medium-sized country – took the Irish contingent to 13.

“There’s more of a kind of a collaborative, consensus-oriented approach in the European Parliament, working in those committees,” says Dr Rory Costello, a political scientist at the University of Limerick.The final vote on a bill by the full Parliament is often just to nod through the committee decision: “usually what happens in the committee is what ultimately the Parliament will decide”.Within the committees, the work is delegated further to an individual MEP called a rapporteur.

No Irish MEP currently has a senior committee position, major rapporteurship or other important institutional job . Fitzgerald is one of the EPP’s ten vice-presidents, though, which probably accounts for her place in the top 100. Within the groups, the arrangements for the very top positions – committee chair – often favour the largest national delegations. The upshot is that committee chairs are invariably from big countries and belong to one of the big groups: a German MEP in the EPP, for instance.

The system for deciding which group gets to pick the rapporteur for a given brief – some being more important than others – also rewards expertise. In Ireland, as in many but not all other countries, being an MEP tends to be seen as a stepping stone towards a domestic political career. Many senior Irish politicians served only short stints as an MEP, such as Mary Lou McDonald , Simon Coveney and Alan Kelly . “It’s sort of seen as a launch pad, rather than an end in itself,” says Andrews.

mckinneytweets Will you give us a quick recap again on how much funding the journal gets from the EU? Thanks.

mckinneytweets They are just there to enrich themselves and get out with a big payoff and pension... they have no influence whatsoever.

mckinneytweets Of course they can,Provided there's any silverware left in the country to sell off, after FG FF greens are finished,

mckinneytweets No

mckinneytweets They don’t do anything at the moment the EU have this country destroyed

mckinneytweets Sure, travel expenses, pensions etc

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