The Government has effectively launched its campaign for a Yes vote in the Nice Treaty referendum, saying that second rejection would damage Ireland, the EU and the states waiting to join.
Two senior Ministers, Mr Brian Cowen and Mr Charlie McCreevy, both claimed yesterday that a second rejection would damage foreign investment in Ireland. Opening the Dáil debate on the Bill enabling the referendum, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, warned that a rejection would lose Ireland friends and influence across Europe.
Fine Gael, Labour and PD speakers in the debate all enthusiastically supported the treaty, but after a last-minute allocation of speaking time, Sinn Féin and Green Party speakers strongly urged rejection.
The deepening row over the rights of small parties and Independents to Dáil time was temporarily defused yesterday when the Government and the Labour Party gave them a total of 50 minutes from their allocations. However, the Greens and Sinn Féin continued to protest yesterday against Dáil Standing Orders, which deem them too small to have speaking time as of right.
Three of the anti-Nice deputies - Independents Mr Finian McGrath and Mr Tony Gregory and Mr Eamonn Ryan of the Green Party - protested outside Leinster House yesterday against the treaty and about the lack of speaking time given to small parties and Independents.
Sinn Féin's Mr Aengus Ó Snodaigh said: "There is no real debate in the House if they sideline our view."
Mr Cowen's opening speech signalled clearly that the Government would adopt a broad pro-EU argument in an attempt to have the treaty passed. Critics of the Yes campaign last year said it was narrowly focused on technical issues and did not harness the pro-EU sentiment within the electorate.