Next week's referendum on the Treaty of Nice could be a very close affair based on a low turnout, according to the latest Irish Times/MRBI poll published in today's newspaper. The shift of seven percentage points from the Yes to the No camp over the last two weeks reflects the intensity and impact of the campaign mounted by the treaty's opponents. If they are not to be successful, this poll must be a loud wake-up call to the Government and those who support the treaty that they need to campaign much more effectively in the next five days. A defeat would be a blow to Ireland's standing in the European Union and the wider international arena.
There has been some improvement in voters' understanding of the issues over two weeks of campaigning, notably a considerable reduction in the numbers saying they do not understand the treaty at all. But there remains a very uneven level of knowledge, with about half the electorate having at best only a vague awareness of what is at stake. This reflects the compressed time period for the debate and the failure to bring home to people what it is about, despite the efforts of the Referendum Commission.
It also reveals that the major parties supporting the treaty have been too slow in mobilising their machines to work on it. While a respectable majority of voters say they intend to vote, experience shows this is quite misleading when polling day comes. Hence the expectation of a low turnout next Thursday.
Ireland's economic, social and political development over the last generation has been intimately bound up with the course of European integration. That has depended in good part on keeping a position in the mainstream of the EU's policy-making and contributing constructively to it. As a result, Ireland has benefitted from the Common Agricultural Policy, the European single market, structural funding and progressive social and human rights legislation. Since the end of the Cold War that agenda has broadened and deepened to take on a more political and security character.
The Treaty of Nice opens up this agenda, especially in the context of EU enlargement. Since this coincides with a steep change in Ireland's own relative position after the phenomenal economic growth of the last few years, it is not surprising that many voters are revisiting many of these assumptions. This can be seen in the changing attitudes to integration revealed in this poll, some of them accentuated by the campaign so far. The question voters must ask is whether such concerns are best dealt with by rejecting the treaty.
That would be such a major step in its negative consequences for this State that those who are contemplating it as a kind of protest vote should think long and hard about whether it is the best course. The campaign has demonstrated to the Government that such concerns - whether of democratic accountability or substantive policies - will have to be taken more fully into account. Those more committed to supporting the major thrust of Ireland's policies should make sure they turn out to vote and be more vocal in their communities.
One way or another, a close result based on a low turnout would provide a most unsatisfactory mandate for Ireland's continuing participation in the EU.