Ireland must shed victim baggage to be role model for new states

IRELAND has taken on the role of head boy to the new member states — being there to welcome them when they join the EU on May 1, identifying with them, offering support and encouragement and holding itself up as an example of what membership can do.

But like every head boy, there are signs that we still have some growing up to do ourselves and in some ways the newcomers are being more adult than us.

Two interesting aspects have arisen in recent weeks one cultural and one financial.

Irish people going abroad are used to trading on the sympathy of former colonised countries. New members who are former Soviet states in particular feel this empathy and believe that Ireland knows how it feels to be small and vulnerable.

They also see Ireland as a role model and a country that has survived and prospered despite being the second-smallest in a union of 15. Culture Minister John O'Donoghue mentioned this during the Irish music concert he hosted in Brussels recently. He referred to 800 years of occupation which was reasonable enough in terms of our musical heritage. However when he repeated the 800 years of occupation by a foreign power nobody felt very comfortable. New members rarely refer to their very recent 50 years of Russian occupation.

There is no doubt that our sorry history has been largely concealed or sanitised in Europe's schools or replaced by the more recent Troubles.

But perhaps it's time we saw our history in a European perspective. Now however the Government seems to be reflecting its ambivalence to the new members when it comes to the issue of a budget for the enlarged Europe.

Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy won't say where Ireland stands on the budget issue. But he does say the philosophy that saw Ireland getting a lot of money from the EU on the basis that they would become a good customer for the donor countries has proved correct.

For Ireland to grow up in Europe could cost us our image as victims.