The Government and Opposition should unite to oppose attempts to create common criminal laws in the European Union, the Minister for Justice, Mr McDowell, has proposed.
In an unusual move, the Minister suggested that the Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and Women's Rights should meet to agree "a consensus position".
Sharply contradicting the support for harmonised EU laws of the former taoiseach, Mr John Bruton, Mr McDowell said: "It is clear that Mr Bruton's views are far in advance of most people here."
Both of the Dáil's two representatives on the Convention, Mr Bruton and Mr Proinsias De Rossa of Labour, have views on European integration that are far ahead of most members of the Oireachtas, he said.
The Convention on the Future of Europe, which is expected to produce a draft European Union treaty in the middle of next year, is becoming increasingly important on the EU political landscape.
So far the convention has heard papers, including one from Mr Bruton, which argue that the EU should have common standards to judge cross-border crime, terrorism and people trafficking.
However, the Government has repeatedly insisted that, while it is prepared to co-operate further, it will not consider allowing justice and home affairs issues to be dealt with by qualified majority voting.
"If ordinary criminal laws were capable of being imposed on Ireland in this way, or if the Irish statutory or constitutional system of criminal procedure were to be amendable by QMV in this way, we would have reached the point, where, as regards criminal law, criminal procedure and related fundamental rights, a European super-state would be at hand," Mr McDowell declared.
"I remain convinced that there is an absolute need for Ireland to retain the right to decide fundamental issues relating to its own substantive criminal law and its own law of criminal procedure."
