Presidency of the Council of the European Union

Ireland's EU presidency places energy resilience at the center of Europe's agenda.

Ireland's 2026 Presidency of the Council of the European Union has placed Dublin in a coordinating role during discussions on European security, competitiveness, and resilience.

Energy security has become a key concern as governments respond to international disruptions affecting markets and supply chains.

Irish officials have highlighted the need to prepare for energy challenges while working within wider European coordination frameworks.

For international audiences, Ireland's presidency shows how smaller EU member states contribute to shaping collective responses to economic and strategic pressures.

For further information, see Irish Presidency of the Council of the European Union , RTA, and Euronews.

Greenland's Arctic security role grows as allies focus on defense cooperation.

Greenland's strategic importance in Arctic and North Atlantic security discussions is increasing as Denmark, Greenland, and allied countries focus on defense cooperation in the region.

Welcome to IBEC Responds.

I'm Neil Willoughby and today we are looking at how important the European relationship has been for Ireland since joining the European Union in 1973 and of course in the context now of the EU presidency, Ireland's eighth presidency.

I'm delighted to be joined today by Bobby McDonagh, a former senior Irish diplomat including as Ireland's permanent representative to the European Union and of course a prominent commentator that many will know on Anglo-Irish and European affairs.

The context today really is to talk obviously about the presidency, but particularly through the lens of a recent publication and book that you've put together, The European Union in 12 Objects, which is obviously something we've just talked about how relatable.

Thank you very much, Bobby.

I know your points you make about being real and serious are fundamentally important.

And I think that's why, you know, IVEC's campaign for the EU presidency, we've two points, competitiveness, quite predictable for a business and employers organisation, but resilience, which is maybe less so, which we've been championing now for more than a year, to have particularly that security element front and centre.

It's a really important point, I think, to finish on.

A little bit different from our regular episodes, but we're going to be talking about Ireland.

Ireland in the EU, you and as you know, it's Ireland's presidency of the Council of the European Union, which is now underway.

It started in July.

and will end in December.

Today's conference builds on that sustained programme of dialogue and a shared commitment to informed, constructive discussion on the future of health and life sciences policy.

I'm particularly pleased that this conference has been recognised as an associated event of the Irish Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

As you know, the logo for the Presidency is Niñártla chur le chéile.

and indeed our strength is working together in unity and today reflects that in terms of our audience and your participation.

Um, and then we ask ourselves, um, you know, you said, uh, these kids are more advanced, but look at all our schools are doing.

Um, I was recently lucky enough to have been at the EU Presidency seminar on child safety online, and at that the Minister, uh, O'Donovan made the following, uh, statement.

He said that, "Our schools can't be asked to take responsibility to solve issues like AI on their own, because they're becoming a landfill site for all societal ills, and need to be allowed to get back to the core business of teaching and learning." Now, that's to paraphrase Minister O'Donovan.

So if you take Irish schools, and you look at all that Irish schools are doing outside the realm of teaching and learning in terms of, you know, um, drugs education, uh, consent, um, AI, digital wellbeing, all of these things, our schools are performing huge amounts of societal, um, societal services outside of teaching and learning.

But it is a crazy situation.

And what's actually unforgivable about this is... is that we've known the European Presidency was coming for several years.

We've had plenty of opportunities to do this.

We've had successive Ministers for Defence, including Taoiseach.