Mairead McGuinness Fine Gael MEP

17th January 2012

“The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible – and achieve it, generation after generation” – Pearl S. Buck, first American woman to win a Nobel Prize for Literature, 1938

Anyone doubting Ireland’s chances of rebounding from this recession with renewed confidence and energy should have gone along to the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition at the RDS in Dublin last week. It was absolutely inspiring to walk amongst the exhibits of the very talented, intelligent secondary and primary school children from all over the country.

I went along on Friday and thanks to the excellent organisation of BT staff enjoyed a fantastic visit. It was great to see the enthusiasm and to watch the next generation of entrepreneurs and scientists, teachers, writers and policy makers take their first opportunity to showcase their potential. It was especially wonderful to have the chance to meet many of my young constituents from the schools of Ireland East.

Lydia Igoe from the Eureka Secondary School in Meath told me about her project which aimed to assess the mental health impact and stress felt by Leaving Certificate Students. Some of her findings are very worrying with a large number of leaving cert students under stress and a significant number with very low self esteem.

The findings by Katherine Murphy from Newbridge College on food labeling also greatly interested me, as the EU is currently assessing our food labels and potentially misleading nutritional health claims.

Other projects that grabbed my attention included one on the powers of estimation of twins, compiled by Georgia Dellow, Anna Dellow and Saoirse C Rawson from the Dominican College, Wicklow.

‘There’s an App for everything’ and now there’s one for literacy too thanks to an idea by Peggy Miller, Catherine Byrne and Anna Julian of St Leo’s College. These young women looked at how mobile phones and texting in particular is impacting negatively on children’s ability to write and spell correctly. Their project was fascinating and the three young women told their story with great enthusiasm. They have designed an App to improve teenage literacy skills via mobile phones. A must have!

All those who took part in the Young Scientist competition are an absolute credit to their parents, teachers and to themselves for committing their energy and intellect to the contest. Congratulations to the overall winners Eric Doyle and Mark Kelly, both aged 17, from Synge Street CBS, Dublin and their project entitled, “Simulation accuracy in the gravitational many-body problem”.

Ratings downgrade

On Friday Standard and Poor’s Ratings Agency downgraded the credit ratings of nine eurozone countries. No surprise in that decision which was well flagged before Christmas. However, it’s a reminder that the problems of the EU have not gone away.
The ratings agency was critical of the current responses to the economic crisis, saying austerity and budget discipline alone were not sufficient.

The eurozone has reiterated its commitment to resolving the crisis time and time again and is currently continuing to work on a new treaty in that regard. The unanswered question is will the new treaty and other new rules signed off on last year, coupled with strict fiscal discipline deliver results? There is an inherent conflict between cutting spending and economic growth.

The downgrade hinders the road to recovery by making it more expensive and thereby possibly more difficult to raise money. The rating agencies have not always been right in their assessments.

Parliamentary elections

Today we elected a new President, Vice-Presidents and Quaestors of Parliament as it is now half-way through our term of office.

Since 2009, the EPP Group to which Fine Gael belongs has been represented by the Presidents of the three leading EU institutions; Jerzy Buzek as President of the European Parliament, Herman Van Rompuy as President of the European Council and José Manuel Barroso as President of the European Commission. Today, Tuesday 17th January, the candidate of the Group of Socialists and Democrats, Germany’s Martin Schultz MEP was elected as President of the European Parliament winning 387 votes. His opening speech to Parliament was strong, defensive of the role of European Parliament and contained warnings about the risk of EU failure.

Compromise between budgetary discipline and growth is needed, he said and he warned against exclusion of the European Parliament from the process. The EPP Group continues to have a huge influence in the Bureau and College of Quaestors of the Parliament with 9 of the 19 seats; 7 Bureau members and two Quaestors including Fine Gael’s Jim Higgins MEP.

The EPP Group will also retain a large number of Committee Chairmanships in the Parliament.