Debate contribution: Irish Presidency of the Council of the European Union

Debate contribution by Mr Gerry Carroll on 2 March 2026.

MLA: Mr Gerry Carroll
Party at the time: People Before Profit Alliance
Date: 2 March 2026
Type: Debate contribution
Business: Private Members' Business
Heading: Irish Presidency of the Council of the European Union
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5433261

Text

The proposer of the motion stated that there are irresponsible actors in the world today who launch wars and, to paraphrase him, wreak havoc on the world. He was obviously talking about Donald Trump and the actions of the US Government in recent days. I note that Pete Hegseth has not ruled out putting boots on the ground in Iran. We need to call out the brutality, gangsterism and thuggery of Donald Trump's regime and what it has committed in Iran in recent days. The Member failed to mention — it has not been mentioned at all in the debate — the role played by European states that are backing the US war on Iran. Britain, Germany and France have all issued statements jointly or separately to say that they support and will back the US attack on Iran or will do so collectively. There has been no mention of that. You cannot laud the EU as the best peace project over the past 50 years and, at the same time, have nothing to say when it is warmongering and banging the war drums.
That obviously points to gaps in the motion. It fails to deal with some of the biggest questions of our day. The Member for East Derry mentioned that in passing as well. We have seen a genocide being committed over the past three years against the Palestinian people. Everybody knows that Biden and Trump backed Netanyahu and financed him and supported that war at every step of the way.
In a second. Those actions would not be possible without the political cover given by the European Union and Ursula von der Leyen, in particular, not to mention the weapons sold by EU member states. Unfortunately, the motion makes absolutely no mention of that. The motion also makes no mention of keeping Ireland neutral, which is more than disappointing. It is a missed opportunity. That is the biggest political debate in the South of Ireland. I suspect that the SDLP does not want to annoy its friends in Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael who are in overdrive mode in trying to undermine the triple lock and become a willing partner in European and American wars across the world.
Yes. Not to be taken off course, I carry no torch for the Iranian regime, but the Member and his party have nothing to say about a school —.
Can I finish the point? Some 185 schoolkids were bombed by the US, and you say nothing about that. I give way to the Member for South Belfast.
You tried that in the last debate. Again, the Member did not answer the question: why is neutrality not in the motion?
Yes: you did not answer the question. It was not in the motion, but that is up to you. Through the Principal Deputy Speaker, that is for the Member. If the Member is happy to erode Irish neutrality, that is on him. Fortunately, the public do not agree. If history teaches us anything, it is that empire and war bring nothing but disaster, death, havoc and destruction. In a general sense, in the debate, from some Members today and just generally in this period, we need less beating of chests and beating of war drums and more recognition that an anti-war movement is needed across the island and across the world. Some politicians, North and South, want to pull the Southern state deeper into more, bigger and longer wars. The truth is that they want and are happy to send working-class kids to be killed and to kill across the world. The Member for Foyle talked about Ireland setting the agenda with the presidency. In theory, that can potentially be a good thing, but I hope that the agenda is not set by the people in the South who are trying to undo neutrality and undermine the triple lock. I hope that it is set by the overwhelming majority of people on the island who are obviously for neutrality and for Palestinian rights. The opinion of the people in the South is crystal clear on the question of neutrality and joining NATO. Again, it is unfortunate that it was not mentioned in the motion. That is despite a relentless campaign — often a hyperbolic propaganda campaign — by most of the Southern media and some, obviously, here as well, in an attempt to vilify and attack previous and current uachtaráin
. For that reason, I am against the UUP amendment. Despite what the motion mentions and despite the vote on the European Union, the North is still in Europe, so there is an anomaly in that. I share the concerns of my TD colleagues in the South who say that the Government are using the presidency of the Council of the European Union as a fig leaf —
— to dismantle Irish neutrality.

813 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.

Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.26 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
No identity-based framing was identified (0.82).
Subject area: Constitutional question, Brexit, the Windsor Framework and sovereignty.
The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.

This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.

Jev’s structured answers

Probability that each statement is true of this text (0 = no, 1 = yes). A criterion counts as met at 0.60 or above.
Question	Probability	Met?
Identity framing	0.24	No
Sectarian or communal antagonism	0.11	No
Cultural grievance politics	0.03	No
Dog-whistle messaging	0.45	No
Controversy escalation	0.16	No
Legitimate policy scrutiny	0.43	No
Overall judgement	0.26	At or below not-flagging threshold

Context and attribution (stance)
Option	Probability
No identity-based framing (chosen)	0.82
Reports or questions it	0.01
Criticises or condemns it	0.04
Adopts it	0.13

Subject area (top five)
Subject	Probability
Constitutional question, Brexit, the Windsor Framework and sovereignty	0.64
No identity-related subject	0.31
Another identity-related subject	0.02
Religion and belief (including people of no religion), churches, faith communities and religious prejudice (including antisemitism and anti-Muslim prejudice)	0.01
Immigration, asylum, race, ethnicity and Travellers	0.01

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:00 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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