People's Movement:Speaking at the launch of a campaign against the Lisbon Treaty in Dublin yesterday, Independent TD Finian McGrath said his agreement to support the Government was in relation to "specific issues" which did not include the treaty.
The Dublin North Central deputy was taking part in a press conference organised by the People's Movement/Gluaiseacht an Phobail, a broad-based alliance which is calling on voters to reject the treaty in the forthcoming referendum, expected to be held next May. Asked about his position in any Dáil vote on the treaty, Mr McGrath said he would "have to consider exactly what the procedures are, if it comes up, but at the moment I would be voting against it".
He did not think the question of bringing down the Government would arise. "I would
love to see a free vote," he added. "My agreement with the Taoiseach is in relation to specific issues in my constituency and also a few national issues, and the European treaty is not part of that agreement," Mr McGrath said.
Former Green Party MEP for Dublin Patricia McKenna said it had been a "tactic" on the part of Taoiseach Bertie Ahern to bring the Greens into government as part of a strategy to "reduce the impact of the people on the No side", because the Greens were "probably the most effective" campaigners against the Nice Treaty.
Rejecting any suggestion of a joint campaign or co-operation with the right-wing French politician, Jean-Marie Le Pen, she said: "The only people who want Le Pen to come here are the Yes side. Bertie Ahern and Dick Roche would love to see him come because they are waiting for an opportunity to discredit the No side."
Nobody had invited Mr Le Pen and nobody she knew on the anti-treaty side "would even want to go within a mile of him". She blamed The Irish Timesfor putting the idea "in Le Pen's head" by raising it with him.
Munster Independent MEP Kathy Sinnott said: "Le Pen is a joke. In the [European] Parliament, he's a joke. He couldn't hold a group together.
"But it's a handy joke when people want to get a hurley to hit you with or something."
But otherwise she expected the No campaign to be "very rich in ideas".
