{"id":536507,"date":"2026-07-06T23:06:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T23:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/536507\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T23:06:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T23:06:09","slug":"ballina-school-cast-into-bureaucratic-spotlight-as-movable-eu-presidency-feast-rolls-on-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/536507\/","title":{"rendered":"Ballina school cast into bureaucratic spotlight as movable EU presidency feast rolls on \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The movable feast that is Ireland\u2019s Council of the European Union<\/a> presidency has rolled into Co Mayo<\/a>, with employment and social affairs ministers and officials from across the 27 member states thrusting a Ballina secondary school into the bureaucratic spotlight on Monday. <\/p>\n

Local boys Dara Calleary<\/a> (the Minister for Social Protection) and Alan Dillon<\/a> (Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise) served as the hosts with the most. They got things under way on Sunday evening with a tour and dinner for the visitors at Foxford Woollen Mills, where a mohair throw costs \u20ac159, since you ask. <\/p>\n

They were delighted to welcome such a gathering to Co Mayo, with both saying it was not just an exercise in showing off their constituency. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s important that events are held outside Dublin,\u201d Dillon said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s important that Mayo can show we can host events like this,\u201d Calleary added. <\/p>\n

In fairness, most of the events during the six-month presidency will be held in Dublin, though Cork, Wicklow, Kerry and Limerick will also be favoured with the presence of EU ministers at various stages. <\/p>\n

The Employment and Social Affairs Council meeting took place at St Mary\u2019s secondary school. At 8am, Calleary was outside greeting arriving dignitaries. Bang on 9am he got things moving in the school hall, which has been converted into a council chamber. Calleary began his remarks in Irish, leading to a scramble for the translation headsets.<\/p>\n

The presidency will be a boon to Irish translators, garda\u00ed looking for a few bob extra (it\u2019s an overtime bonanza) and the suppliers of the squadrons of swanky black limousines and minivans<\/a> required to ferry the Eurocrats from airports to hotels to meeting venues. <\/p>\n

About 150 delegates came to Ballina. As well as EU member states, representatives of some nations aspiring to join \u2013 including Ukraine \u2013 attend these meetings and then there is a plethora of organisations, from trade unions to employers\u2019 groups to interest groups of various stripes, in tow. <\/p>\n

About half of the EU member states sent ministers or deputy ministers \u2013 others sent civil servants or ambassadors.<\/p>\n

Security \u2013 the great fear for the presidency \u2013 was tight. There was a protest by local pro-Palestinian activists outside the school. <\/p>\n

\u201cAh, they\u2019re grand,\u201d said the Minister. <\/p>\n

So what did they talk about? This was an \u201cinformal\u201d meeting, meaning that there are no agreed conclusions. There were three sessions which focused on poverty, unemployment and access to the workplace for people with disabilities<\/a>. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s serious business, the presidency. It\u2019s easily dismissed as endless meetings, protocol and process, but how many social and economic advances have come in Ireland due to the EU\u2019s influence? <\/p>\n

There are 10 priorities in the employment and social affairs area for the Irish presidency, ranging from housing to disabilities to equal protection.<\/p>\n

Calleary is especially focused on the disability issue because he admits \u201cwe have a very poor disability employment gap\u201d. He is trying to persuade employers to take on more people with disabilities, not out of charity but because \u201cyou are missing out on an extremely, extraordinarily talented bunch of people who have a lot to offer to your organisation\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a huge amount of work to do,\u201d he said. \u201cI want to learn from Europe as to how we can do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

With its history of exclusion and emigration, poverty and resilience, Mayo is as good as any place for that. Different nowadays, of course. <\/p>\n

Ireland\u2019s economic fortune, with almost full employment, is well known to its European partners, who struggle with bigger problems. But past performance is no guarantee of future success. The latest official figures show Ireland\u2019s unemployment rate has inched upwards<\/a> and there are growing concerns about the impact of AI on tech jobs. <\/p>\n

Like the Mayo football team, whose flags are flying everywhere here in advance of next weekend\u2019s trip to Croke Park, we would be wise to guard against complacency. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The movable feast that is Ireland\u2019s Council of the European Union presidency has rolled into Co Mayo, with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536508,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,7038,43],"class_list":["post-536507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-irish-politics","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536507"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536507\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}