Ireland will take over the presidency of the Council of the European Union at the start of July until the end of the year. What will that mean in practice – and what should the Government expect in the role?
What is the council?
The council of the EU is the body that represents the national governments in the complex, often-opaque, Brussels political system. It is separate to the European Commission, the executive led by Ursula von der Leyen that proposes laws, and the European Parliament.
The council presidency rotates between the 27 EU states every six months. Ireland will take over from Cyprus and pass the role to Lithuania.
Ministers from each member state meet to hash out common positions, usually in Brussels. Sometimes they need to agree by consensus, sometimes a majority vote will do. There is often a fair amount of haggling and deal-making involved.
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Finance, foreign affairs and agriculture ministers gather for EU council meetings about once a month, others less frequently. Health and education ministers are a rarer sight, because the EU does not have as much remit to set common policy in those fields. Ireland last held the EU presidency in 2013.
What does the EU presidency do?
The country holding the EU presidency is responsible for brokering deals and compromises, to steer the debate towards an agreed position. Irish Ministers will chair the council meetings involving their 26 counterparts over the six months.
The chair is meant to be an honest broker who focuses on the broader EU agenda, rather than their own narrow national interest.
For example, that might involve Irish Ministers, along with the Republic’s top diplomats in Brussels, negotiating a back room deal to get the German government to drop their opposition to some proposal, or convince the French to tone down their demands on something.
The Government will then represent the agreed council position in negotiations with the European Commission and European Parliament, to arrive at a final EU decision.
What issues are likely to come up?
Ireland will be expected to get all 27 governments to agree on the size and shape of the EU’s next seven-year budget by Christmas.
The Government will have to square demands for more spending in defence and other areas, opposition to cutting Common Agricultural Policy (Cap) farm subsidies and development funding, and resistance from national capitals to up their financial contributions into the common pot. That will be tough.
Developments in the Ukraine war and volatile relations between Europe and the Trump administration will no doubt feature heavily. Ireland believes it can act as something of a bridge between Brussels and Washington, according to a confidential early draft of its priorities for the EU role.
Ireland will be expected to drive forward EU efforts to increase the amount countries spend on defence and their militaries.
A peace deal in Ukraine would have massive ramifications for the future security of Europe, for better or worse depending on the terms of any settlement.
A truce could involve a commitment that the EU fast-tracks Ukraine’s bid for membership, which would require the bloc to rewrite its accession rules governing entry into the union. That would be a real political minefield for whatever government held the rotating presidency and a massive diplomatic job to land an agreement on.
Then there is the conveyor belt of more mundane EU laws that Ireland must shepherd through the system.
The government holding the presidency can put a spotlight on certain policies it is keen to shove forward, but broadly the agenda is set either by the commission or wider political circumstances.
Irish Ministers will not be able to dictate the debate and the council presidency is one cog in a larger machine.
Will that be a lot of work?
The EU presidency will be a significant undertaking. The role will suck up a fair amount of bandwidth for the six months, both at senior levels of Government and across the Civil Service.
A lot of the legwork will be done by Ireland’s diplomats and officials in Brussels, in its “permanent representation” to the EU. The size of the office has doubled to about 250 people, in preparation for the presidency. When Denmark held the role last year a core group of officials in their EU “perm rep” worked six days a week for the six months.
The Government is planning to host about 22 minister-level council meetings in Ireland, as well as a major summit of nearly 50 European presidents and prime ministers in Dublin in November, which will require a big logistical and security operation to pull off successfully.
Hosting the EU presidency is estimated to cost about €300 million. More than a third of that will go towards security costs.
Cabinet Ministers have spent the last number of months making a greater effort to attend EU-level meetings, to get to know their opposite numbers. They have also been travelling to European Parliament sessions in Strasbourg, to make contact with senior MEPs working on legislation that cuts across their briefs. Those relationships will all become important in negotiations during Ireland’s presidency.
