 Invitation, as it has been mentioned, I've been here twice in the Institute. We were studying pretty close the Irish example, not because of the close affinities, both historically and culturally, but also because when we were entering the Union we were looking at different cases of different countries, how well they used the possibility of membership. And obviously in the 90s when I was here, Ireland was one of the best examples. The miracle of the Celtics Tiger and we were looking at your experiences. We were trying to follow in your footsteps when it came to using the EU funds. In the 90s it looked much better than later on. It seems that there were much more positive lessons to be learned. But I think that even now after a certain share of problems we look to Ireland quite often because you are the case in point of how to deal with difficult circumstances, how to show determination, how to be able to benefit from European integration even when the going is a little bit tougher than before. So we look at Ireland with quite a lot of hope and we try to learn all the lessons. Mostly positive as I've said, but also certain lessons that can be omitted. And on many issues we see eye to eye. And that's why when I speak to my colleagues in the Council I always seek for the Irish point of view. We consider ourselves being the Mediterranean's of the east. You are the Mediterranean, the Mediterranean's of the north. And besides all the other cultural affinities that everyone knows about I think that it is sometimes easier for us to talk to each other and sometimes it is to talk to some of our more heart headed partners. Recently a poll was conducted in Dublin Island with a question whether the recent enlargement had any adverse effect on the labour market. 76% of the respondents in Dublin answered that, well, yes, I mean the recent enlargement of the European Union had certain adverse effect on the labour market. 24% said that, no, it had no impact on the labour market. So as you can see these affinities are even stronger when it comes to the participation of some of our citizens in the development and economic growth of Ireland. And when I talk to my, because I came here from London, when I talk to my British colleagues, when I want to make them angry I always tell them if you want to talk immigration maybe you are going to study the Irish example and then maybe we can move beyond politics into the realm of real problems which are not as serious as one would predict. Anyhow, I'd like to talk a little bit about the Polish experience and tell you a few things about how I see our role in the European Union and how I see our European policy and tell you a little bit about the institutional dilemmas that are before us and to be absolutely frank I think that I have more questions to put to you than answers but maybe then during our Q&A session we can dig a little bit deeper into some of those problems. First of all I think that we have done quite a good job in the past 10 or 15 years when it comes to integrating ourselves with the European Union and I remember at the end of the 90s of the previous century I was responsible as a think tanker for preparing a study I was participating in it which was entitled Cost and Benefits of Enlargement we were trying to foresee in 1998 what would be the costs and benefits of our enlargement of the European Union and I think that it was very difficult for us to foresee all the consequences but we were much more pessimistic than we are now I mean we wouldn't have predicted that we would do so well in the European Union and that the stereotype of a pole would change so quickly all around Europe because I think that the most important thing that we've gained and this is not just me being cocky and too happy about myself and about my country but that perspires from all the conversations that I have with my friends German, French, Irish, British and so on that we convinced our partners that most importantly we are a very credible member of the European Union I remember this joke which was made during 2002-03 when we were negotiating accession people were saying that with those poles we will have only problems because they will be as terrorizing as the Spaniards, as arrogant as the French and as optish out as the Brits and I think that we proved that it's not true first of all we are not optish out we try to participate as much as possible and if one agrees a certain policy with us we deliver and we are credible we are not going to change our mind three times after we've agreed on something sometimes we are a difficult partner and heart-headed but it doesn't mean that we are not constructive and we try to bring forward arguments and we try to work for a compromise and as I've said I mean this is not me praising my own countries negotiating tactics but this is what comes from our friends so we are constructive and we think that we need to work together towards strengthening the European construction we are not dogmatic however and I think that this is a proof of our maturity that if you were to ask me whether we need more Europe or less Europe I would simply say it depends I mean there are definitely those areas when we need more Europe when it comes to economic coordination for example and those are the lessons learned from the economic crisis when it comes to energy union and energy independence in today's geopolitical climate incidentally we were working on it eight or nine years ago I used to work in the European Parliament first as an advisor then as a member and we were preparing a report on energy security in 2007 and our friends were telling us eh you are obsessed come on you don't need it I mean this will be perceived by Russia as anti-Russian and we are just preparing in 2008 under German presidency big opening for spaces of freedom with Russia and so on and so forth we really don't need it and stop being obsessed about energy security and now everyone tells us you were right all along so I mean there are definitely those areas when we need more integration but there are also those areas where we need less integration when there is too much regulation where the union regulates in areas where it shouldn't either because it simply doesn't have the right competence or because it simply is too costly when it comes to the public perception I'm going to give you one example do we really need to be very specific in our regulation about tobacco and talk about the packaging, how it should look like and whether we can smoke slims or menthol cigarettes I mean is it really a competence of the union? I mean health as such and I'm not talking about you know whether this regulation makes sense or not I'm just talking about whether it should be regulated with such a detail on the European level second example that I always use is a regulation concerned with the power of the vacuum cleaners that you know the more powerful vacuum cleaners have been forbidden and again it makes sense because we want to save energy but do we really want these kind of directives and regulation to go through which cost us dearly when it comes to the perception of the public opinion incidentally I had the biggest row with my wife because she told me that as a politician you know I was completely useless I should have chosen a different path in my life and on top of that when I could become useful and buy a stronger vacuum cleaner three days before the regulation was in place I didn't even tell her and everyone in Warsaw bought stronger vacuum cleaners and we are stuck with ours which is not as strong as it should be at least that's what my wife tells me so as you can see I mean there is a lot of there are a lot of areas in which I think that the union regulates too much or too heavy handedly and I think that it's good that there is a brief fit program now it will be probably treated much more seriously by the European Commission where commission intimments was charged with that file with that dossier second thing is besides not being dogmatic is that we are not fixating on any partner in the European Union I mean obviously we use all the possible formats such as the Weimar triangle such as the Wischigrad group and so on but we try to talk to everyone and you know the reality of the European Union is that there are a lot of shifting coalitions and sometimes we do things with the Brits sometimes we do things with the Irish sometimes we do things with the Wischigrad group sometimes we do things with the French and the Germans obviously we use the potential of all of those Weimar triangles very important for us as the Wischigrad group but we are not fixated on just one partner I think it is quite natural that when you want to know the position of our partners you immediately consent with the position of Germany or France and Great Britain because they are leading countries in the European Union but we want to know the position of every other member state because only through that I think you can be effective when it comes to the dilemmas that we have before us as I've told you I will more or less sketch out the dilemmas without giving specific answers because it would be quite difficult to give those specific answers but I will share with you my assessment what will be the questions that we will be asked to tackle together especially when it comes to the institutional setup of the European Union first of all I would say that there is always this tension between effectiveness on the one hand and legitimacy on the other our biggest problem is that when we didn't have full to use the academic term input legitimacy we always had the output legitimacy we were delivering and many people were saying yes the system is complicated yes people do not really understand how it works but they support the European construction because it delivers on so many fronts the problem in the previous years was that it stopped delivering and we had problems with delivery and then obviously that weakens the whole construction so the most important thing, the most important task before us is to do our utmost to start delivering on the promises that we've made and that we start meeting the expectations of the people who elected us for the jobs that we currently hold and this really is important I mean I remember that everyone was saying when we were preparing the Constitutional Treaty and the Lisbon Treaty this will save the day you know because we need the institutional reform and I was as a humble think tanker I was saying come on come on I mean it will create quite a lot of problems a lot of institutional tensions it will not resolve the problems that we have with the economic coordination I mean for example the new voting system I mean is it really about democracy it's about changing shifting power and so on and so forth and I remember that I was attacked by some of my friends at different conferences who were saying oh you're young you don't understand the European construction Lisbon is about strengthening the European construction it will resolve most of our problems and we need it and so on and so forth do we need the changes which are there? of course we do but I mean first of all it is true that we were concentrating on the things which proved to be of secondary importance because we should have concentrated on the questions of economic governance and we haven't done anything on that for the previous years we just started it about two years ago three years ago when the crisis hit us and secondly it is also true that even though we desperately need the reforms of the Lisbon Treaty some of the problems were not resolved and some of the problems I would even submit to you were made even more difficult because of the high complexity of the institutional system and now when it comes to the tension between legitimacy and effectiveness this is a problem that we are going to have for years to come because on the one hand we want to legitimize the construction we want to strengthen the democratically elected the European Parliament with more transparency and so on and so forth yet with 28 member states and with the Parliament being a co-legislator it is very very difficult to deliver on that promise and more and more is happening more and more of the decision making is made in ways which are not totally transparent but we are more effective thanks to that the question is how to balance the two you know there are many good cases in point but for example you know how the decisions are really made in the Council which now is a creature of the Prime Ministers and how European Council is being prepared it is hellishly complicated and it doesn't go through a normal machinery of the Council of the European Union anymore look at the European Parliament how the decisions are made almost everything is done in a first reading through trilogues where only the guys who are in the loop take the decisions the rapporteurs, the co-ordinators and so on and so forth and when a given thing hits the committee I mean usually most of the decisions are already made informally and there is no time for the normal due process to take hold because people because of effectiveness they want to take decisions as quickly as possible look at the European Parliament after the rise of the Eurosceptics most of the things are now even more than before of the things are done by the big coalition by the great coalition and I've been a co-ordinator of the EPP so I know how it works just co-ordinators sit, they do a deal and then they present it to others because that's the effective way to go about and that's why we have effectiveness but is it fully transparent and fully legitimate I mean there are questions I mean there's always this balance to be struck and with the rising Eurosceptics I mean we have more of that trend and sometimes we complain about the Eurosceptics but we do not react to that I mean we do decisions we take decisions as if nothing happened and sometimes it's difficult sometimes you see the difference between the socialists and the Christian Democrats in the European Parliament but then when it comes to decision making those differences are not that apparent and sometimes we regulate as much as we did before not taking into account that people not only those who vote for Eurosceptics but people sometimes are tired with over regulation coming from the European Union that's why I think that this will be the biggest problem that we will have we definitely need that effectiveness but we need to strike the right balance and it's in a system in an institutional system which is so hellishly complicated it will be difficult when it comes to the challenges brought forward by certainly institutions themselves again I think we have more problems and more questions than answers and it will be living in a very interesting time observing how institutions change incidentally I started working as a think tanker in 1996-97 and my first job was to study the reflection group report and then preparation for the Amsterdam Treaty by the way one of the books that I've read then was a book done here an analysis of the Amsterdam Treaty which sort of you know went into detail that I was studying then and I remember that my boss told me well after Amsterdam Treaty is done you have to start researching something different because it will be the end of the institutional form because that was supposedly that was the treaty which was to prepare enlargement so you better start doing budget or something else because you know institutions I mean we've been reforming them since the single European Act come on for ten years it's enough and then what then we had you know the NIST Treaty and then I was working in the Ministry of European Integration and we were studying the changing system of votes weighing I don't know whether you remember Shiraq when he wanted to give us less votes than the Spaniards and then he said that it was a mistake of his secretary who was putting the numbers into the tables and so on and again my boss told me okay but after NIST come on that's gonna be it and then I got elected to the European Parliament and he said well go to the Constitution Committee because no one knows it and he referred to death because nothing will happen there after Constitutional Treaty you know after Lisbon and so on but you have to be there but then you will do the real job in the internal market committee and then again you know we had changes two-pack, six-pack and so on and seems that we've done everything we could with the changes of the treaties yet all the institutional system all the institutional problems are still on the table relations between European Council and the Council itself new president of of the European Council whom I know pretty well whether he will behave differently whether he will use some of the potential of the treaty that was not used by Van Rompuy for example when it comes to foreign policy what will be his relations to Morgherini Morgherini herself will she make use of the commission had more often than Ashton than Lady Ashton as she says she would what will be the future of the external action service the commission itself I remember that when I was talking to some of the specialists they were saying only the commissioners with portfolio would matter the vice presidents will not matter because you know they have no bureaucracy to help them implement their ideas and now look I mean Junker plan investment plan is prepared by Katainen not by Moscovici Energy Union is prepared by Sefsovich not by Kagnete and so on but there is a big enigma how this new two-tiered commission will really work in practice it will probably be more politicized it will probably be much more focused which is good because Junker and Timmermans published the ten priorities and they said quite openly that the union cannot do everything it has to focus on things it will probably be the regulation will be much wiser they will not over-regulate and sometimes with the refit program it will even think about stopping some regulation that has already been made but how it will work in practice it will be a big question and also what will be the relations to the council will it be less dependent on the council and will it cooperate more closely or more politically with the European Parliament those are really very very serious questions and without treaty change we will have quite a lot of shifts in the institutional balance of the union and it is sometimes hard to predict how these shifts will look like and sometimes it's hard to predict what would be really good for the European integration as such especially that as you know for example the President of the European Council which is essentially an intergovernmental creature doesn't behave in an intergovernmental way quite often I don't have to tell you that because you are experts and specialists but I mean there are no easy answers how the system will develop and there are more questions than answers and a lot will really depend on chemistry between people and on how certain people are whether they have clear ideas of what they want to do how determined they will be and so on and so forth so those are basically the questions for us and also quite a lot of questions about concrete areas deepening internal markets what to do about investment energy union treating seriously digital agenda I used to be a Minister of Digitisation and Administration before I shifted into this job so I know this quite well European Parliament again with the changing composition of the European Parliament there are quite a few questions how it will operate in reality especially as I've said with the big grand majority how it will treat the fringes we might not like some of the French parties but I think we have to take into consideration the concerns of the people who elected them and if we are going simply to close our eyes I don't think to some of the problems I don't think that we are going to be better off I think that the recipe is first of all as I've said not to be dogmatic and this is what characterises the Polish position try to think pragmatically what will be good for the development of the European integration around what our citizens tell us and try to respond to their fears especially in the changing times where people communicate differently I will give you one example I was preparing I was responsible I was head of the campaign of Warsaw four years ago with deputy chairwoman of our political party Civic Platform and you know she was preparing the program and I said how about if we were to check what the citizens want themselves so that the politician will not speak ex-cathedra what she thinks should be done and it's just how should we go about it and I said let's check do people search for in Warsaw on Google most often so we did it and it turned out that who was really most active in Warsaw on Google and who was asking the biggest amount of questions on how the city works I mean everyone expected young people the one well connected and so on no single mothers this was the biggest group of active citizens on the net and I had a lot of questions about how the city really works because they left their smaller cities villages and so on they do not have a close contact with their family usually in the old times you would ask your mother or your aunt and now you ask the all knowing Mr. Google and it turned out that for example the biggest problems for them was that they couldn't change the diapers of their kid when they were doing business in the town hall and so on and so forth and it turned out that actually tackling problems which seemed secondary for a politician were much more important than huge investments in another bridge in Warsaw so in a sense we have to this is a simple example but we have to learn because now the communication especially when it comes to social media is two way no more a politician can tell his citizen what he wants what he has to engage in a conversation we have to do it in the European Union because if we don't the gap especially that we are weakening sometimes legitimacy for the sake of effectiveness we have to do it in order to to deal with some of the problems that are before us at the end I will tell you that the worst thing that can happen to us is that we are going to have a lost decade in the European Union because of the economic crisis we are going to look at Japan this is the greatest threat that we have if you are not going to be ready if we are not going to find niches for development which will propel growth and investment if you are not going to treat seriously the potential of internal market digital and so on and so forth we are not going to develop quickly and we are going to lose a decade just as Japan did and I think that we cannot afford it different and I think that Ireland is a meaningful example and we look at you quite often because your message to Europe was a message of determination and even though you found yourself in a difficult situation in the dire straits you proved that you can do something about it if you are committed and I think that many of our friends in Europe we in Poland as well need that that example simply fueled by the knowledge that hard work will pay off and also trying to concentrate on real problems, not concentrate on political problems which are invented such as immigration that's why I tell my friends to watch the Irish example I think that we shouldn't be fueling anxiety and fear but we should show determination that we have answers to some of the problems that we have in Europe and that's what we should try to to address and it is addressed here quite well that's why our eyes are quite often on you and the links are being strengthened and some of those polls who got the right know-how in Ireland are coming back, opening up businesses I've heard that there is a kindergarten in Warsaw which has Gaelic as a language because people want to keep up the things that they've learned here, not only the know-how but also culturally so yes, I mean we are becoming in Poland a little bit more multicultural which not always for a Catholic is a badge of honour but we are trying to change that also and try to be as open as possible and to use that as something depicting the roads that we've taken quite a few years back and as I've said it's always good to talk to our Irish friends because your views are always refreshing which cannot be said about some of our other partners that I will not mention by name thank you very much