Ireland is at risk of becoming “significantly underrepresented at all levels” of the European Union’s executive body that steers policy, as senior Irish officials retire and are not replaced, the Department of Foreign Affairs has said.
The shortage of Irish people working across the middle layers of the European Commission, the union’s powerful executive arm that proposes and enforces EU laws, is a concern for the department.
Member states view having a good spread of their nationals in senior positions in the commission as crucial, to help subtly shape and influence EU policy at an early stage.
Nearly a third of Irish people working in the commission are due to retire in the next four years, with low numbers joining at entry level.
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Internal department briefings warned that Ireland could soon be in a position where it was “significantly underrepresented at all levels” of the key EU body, which is led by Ursula von der Leyen. “Decreasing levels of representation also make it more difficult for Ireland to reverse the problem,” officials warned in the briefing.
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For every four Irish people retiring from high-ranking commission posts, only one passed the EU executive’s competitive recruitment process. “The pipeline of Irish officials currently in place at lower levels is not sufficient to replace the numbers leaving at the higher levels,” the department stated.
A rise in the number of people working as Irish language translators, interpreters and lawyer linguists – since Irish became one of the 24 official languages of the EU in 2022 – has done little to ease fears about this looming demographic cliff edge.
This was because these roles are viewed as being “remote from policy decisions”, officials wrote in a September 26th, 2024, briefing paper.
Recent increases in the number of linguists hide the shortage of other Irish officials elsewhere in the commission, which “is the big cause of concern,” the briefing said.
Internal commission data shows of the more than 30,500 people employed as officials or contract staff in the EU executive, 513 are Irish. This does not include 70 Irish people working as translators and linguists. One department source said there were routes for linguists to move into more policy focused roles down the line.
The commission’s recruitment process, which requires candidates to be proficient in at least two EU languages, is “very intensive and lengthy”, the department paper stated.
“The opportunity for Irish graduates to secure good jobs far more easily elsewhere is one reason it is not tempting to apply in the first place or to keep trying after failing once,” it said.
Networks and lobbying were “essential” to land a job after passing the initial recruitment tests, something officials suggested did not favour Irish candidates.
In a January 9th letter, then minister of State for Europe, Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, said Ireland was one of 11 EU states whose nationals were “significantly underrepresented” in entry-level commission jobs. The correspondence was sent to then-taoiseach Simon Harris.
Ireland and other states were pushing for the commission to introduce separate “nationality-based competitions,” alongside existing open contests, which she said would hopefully increase the amount of Irish officials hired.
In the meantime she said it was important Government departments allowed civil servants to be seconded to work in the commission as policy experts.
“Every high potential candidate who goes to Brussels is an immediate loss to the domestic system. We have to find the right balance between the needs of the domestic system now and making the long-term investment in our representation in the institutions,” she wrote.
The correspondence and internal briefings were released to The Irish Times on foot of a Freedom of Information Act request.
