The Tánaiste, Ms Harney, has ruled out any voting pact between the Progressive Democrats and their coalition partners, Fianna Fáil, for the European elections.
However, Ms Harney said she expected that many of her party members would back Fianna Fáil's candidate, Mr Eoin Ryan TD, in Dublin, and the independent candidate and TD for Sligo-Leitrim, Ms Marian Harkin, in the North-West constituency.
"We are going to leave it to the various constituencies to decide on the basis of the candidates in their areas," Ms Harney said at NUI Galway yesterday.
"We are not going into an alliance with anybody," she stressed. "However, in the North-West constituency Ms Harkin would have close links with the party, and at a personal level a lot of our policies would be very similar. I know a lot of members in Galway are keen to support her.
"The party's organisation will be free to make a decision at local level, and we are not making any decision at national level."
Yesterday Mr Ryan welcomed the Tánaiste's endorsement.
"Eoin would be very glad of support from PD voters," his spokeswoman said.
A spokesman for Mr Ryan's Fianna Fáil running mate, Mr Royston Brady, said he would not be commenting. Mr Brady has a stormy relationship with senior members of the Progressive Democrats. Last September he issued an apology to the Minister for Justice, Mr McDowell, whom he had earlier accused of being "an arrogant bully". He made the remark in the mistaken belief that Mr McDowell had refused to meet him to discuss crime in Dublin.
The Fianna Fáil MEP for the North-West, Mr Sean Ó Neachtain, said his experience on the ground in the Galway area was that he was drawing a lot of support from the PDs. Galway was a PD "heartland", he said, and many members were former Fianna Fáil supporters. "I would know many of them, and I am getting a very positive response from them", he said.
Mr Ó Neachtain's running mate, Minister of State Dr Jim McDaid called on Ms Harkin to "declare her position" in relation to the PDs. "I am glad to hear her party is backing a Fianna Fáil candidate in Dublin, but in relation to my constituency, it shows that Marian Harkin must be on the verge of joining the PDs," Dr McDaid said.
"We know that she is very close to the party, and she has confirmed publicly that she was approached by the PDs. So I think it is time now that Ms Harkin came clean and declared where she stands on this in the interests of her own people" , Dr McDaid said during a visit to Galway.
Ms Harney said the PDs regretted they was not in a position to run a "winning candidate" in the European poll. It was a small party and there was "no point in spending a couple of hundred thousand on people who would have had no chance of winning".