The declining number of Irish people working at middle levels in the European Union’s key institutions is a “serious problem,” the Foreign Office warned in internal briefings.
A large number of Irish officials in the European Commission – the EU’s executive body that proposes and enforces laws and implements policies and the EU budget – is seen as crucial in influencing policy at an early stage.
About a third of Irish civil servants currently working in EU institutions will retire by 2026, according to the ministry. Officials warned privately that this would mean Ireland would lose influence as many of the current senior civil servants would retire.
“Ireland is facing a serious problem in terms of its declining representation (among EU staff for demographic reasons),” an internal briefing said. “The government recognises the importance of Irish personnel on the staff of the EU institutions as a channel for Irish influence in the EU,” the briefing continued.
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The April 10 briefing was prepared for Minister of State for European Affairs Jennifer Carroll MacNeill and made available to The Irish Times in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.
Commenting on the issue, an Irish Commission official said the decline in Irish representation on the powerful body would damage the country’s influence in the future. There would be “no one at the table” who could raise concerns about the particular sensitivity or impact of a proposed policy on Ireland during the initial discussions, the source said.
A good network of officials in the Commission would also help reduce the “gap” between policy-making at EU level and domestic politics, according to another Irish source.
The notion that Ireland was fighting above its means in Brussels was exaggerated, they said. Other countries like the Netherlands were much better at strategically influencing policy from within, before anything landed on the desks of diplomats or politicians. “We are missing out a little bit by not using our network within the institutions,” the Irish Commission official said. “If we are not represented at every level, at the junior and senior levels, that will be a loss,” they said.
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Another Irish source said part of the demographic decline was due to the fact that many staff who had applied for jobs in the Commission in the years following Ireland’s accession to the EU were now at the end of their careers. Over the past two decades there has also been increased competition for Commission posts from staff from Central and Eastern European countries, which joined the Union in 2004.
In addition to the high-ranking officials in the Commission, there are also a number of Irish people in other high-ranking EU positions. For example, Emer Cooke is head of the European Medicines Agency, Tony Murphy is President of the European Court of Auditors and Philip Lane is Chief Economist of the European Central Bank.
A spokesman for Ireland’s Foreign Office said the government hoped to “significantly increase” the number of successful applications from Irish candidates for posts in EU institutions in the coming years. “They are useful contact points for Irish government officials on EU matters and can provide early information to the Irish system about important upcoming policy or legislative decisions,” the spokesman said.
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The ministry said its aim was to recruit an additional 50 Irish staff to work in the EU institutions by 2030. The internal briefing said this would be achieved by encouraging Irish people to apply for EU jobs and by “equipping Irish candidates with the skills they need to succeed in selection processes”.