Now that the plan to set up two regions in the State has been approved by the Cabinet there is an opportunity to examine it critically in political debate. Regionalisation is designed to optimise receipts from the EU structural funds, crucially to keep Objective 1 status for a group of 15 counties over the next budgetary period.
It is fair to describe them as minimalist, inspired by that precise purpose, rather than by any wider commitment to devolution or decentralisation of political and administrative power in this State. That they have been drawn up by the Department of Finance, that bastion of centralism, is revealing indeed.
The two bodies would be given responsibility to oversee expenditure on structural funds, including the reallocation of payments and the preparation of annual and mid-term reviews. Representation would consist of two representatives from each of the county councils involved, plus representatives from existing regional sub-groupings. Crucially, they must find acceptance from Eurostat, the EU's statistical service in Brussels, and from the Regional Affairs commissioner, Ms Monika Wulf-Mathies, who has referred several times to their need to reflect "a distinct administrative reality". ail and the Progressive Democrats and the independents who support them, as a result of which Clare and Kerry were added on to the Objective 1 group
The decision to include Kerry and Clare within the Objective 1 group smacked more of political opportunism and old-fashioned clientele-ism than of a new political and administrative culture of regional development. For all that, few will quarrel with the political intention to optimise EU transfers in what looks increasingly like a really difficult set of negotiations for Ireland on the Agenda 2000 package over the next couple of months. The question now is whether it will be possible to build further on the proposals by injecting a more genuine regional content and consciousness into them.
This argument should not be driven solely by how to secure the most favourable regime of transfers from Brussels. It has to do more profoundly with the relationship between regional development, democracy and political participation in this State. It is time to look beyond the period when structural funds were so important in developing this State's infrastructure; in future, there will be much more need for self-reliance, self-confidence, democratic empowerment and accountability.
Such a vocabulary has been used effectively by pressure groups in the west of Ireland over recent years in their campaigns for devolution of political and administrative power. It is echoed in the criticisms levelled at the regionalisation proposals by the 15-County Committee, a group of representatives from the north-east region, who have produced a valuable report proposing new devolved structures to implement regional development. They include the capacity to make decisions on how and where money is spent and a continuum of structures linking county, sub-regional and regional bodies. They suggest the principle of social partnership should apply, supplementing elected representatives. But in the light of prolonged inaction and current minimalism on the subject it is not difficult to sympathise with its chairwoman, Ms Marion Harkin, when she says: "All of our politicians say this is the way we should go, but in practice it doesn't happen. It is all rhetoric. It is cosmetic".