Irish people were "extremely disconnected" from the EU legislative process, Mr Séamus Brennan, Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach, said yesterday.
People regarded arrangements between their Government and Europe as "a well-kept secret", he said.
Mr Brennan was speaking in Dublin Castle at the 17th meeting of the Forum on Europe.
"Decisions made in Europe affect all of us every single day," he said.
"More often than not we are completely unaware of the implications of the new legislation and directives until after they become law, by which time it's much too late to influence or alter the content."
He said the monitoring of EU issues in Ireland was less rigorous than in other states. "Clearly the Union requires more transparency and its citizens have to find it more comprehensible," he said.
Mr Brennan said his experience with European issues showed him the "yawning awareness gap" between what transpired in EU institutions and citizens' grasp of matters.
"How we make the national executives more accountable for the conduct of EU business surely must be at the very heart of whatever we do."
The reform of Dáil procedures would improve the scrutiny of EU issues, Mr Brennan said. These reforms would be in place for the next Oireachtas.
Earlier at the forum, Mr Claus Larnsen-Jensen, president of the European Affairs Committee of the Danish parliament, said it would be a catastrophe if EU enlargement procedures were not finalised by December.
Denmark will hold the EU Presidency later this year, and he warned that if the Nice Treaty was not ratified by the end of the year, countries opposed to enlargement would use this as an excuse not to proceed.
"It's quite clear that we have to get the Nice Treaty ratified in each and every country before, otherwise we are running the risk that we cannot succeed.
"This is a question of healing the wounds of the division of Europe," he said.
Mr Larnsen-Jensen said this was a time for huge changes in Europe and these must be discussed.
"What type of Europe do we want? What do we like? What do we dislike? What do we want changed?" he asked.
He said the public must be actively involved in these discussions and not just in an artificial dialogue.
"EU decisions are not mainly taken by bureaucrats in Brussels but in reality are taken by our own ministers in the Council of Ministers," Mr Larnsen-Jensen said.
