15th EPP Congress
Our future: A strong Europe
17 - 18 October 2002
Estoril - Portugal

Thursday, 17 October 2002

Mr President, prime ministers, ladies and gentlemen……


You will understand that, as I am still campaigning for the ratification of the Nice Treaty, my speech today is also addressed to the Irish electorate. In 48 hours, Ireland will go to the polls. How we vote will decide the future of our country, and indeed of Europe itself, for generations to come. That’s why our answer must be, and I am hopeful that it will be, YES to Nice.


As the Leader of the Opposition in Ireland, I am very pleased to be able to report to you today, on the final, and therefore critical, stages of the Second Nice Treaty Referendum campaign. I am proud to say that Fine Gael, as committed Europeans, have led the campaign for a YES vote. Notwithstanding a significant number of ‘Undecideds’, I am hopeful, that this time, the Treaty will be ratified. It is, undeniably, in all our interests that it should be.


There is a certain irony that it is we, the Irish, who will decide the fate of the new Europe. In many ways, we never shared the history of Europe: war, the devastation of the great cities, genocide and mass migration. (Though, occupation, we knew too well.) Geography and our later neutral stance meant we didn’t have to share it. Consequently, we never marvelled, as perhaps we could have, at the extraordinary strength of the European Union, coming as it did, so soon after the possibility of there being no Europe at all.


But now, we of all Europeans, are to have the ultimate say in the future of the continent and of its peoples. In that future, a new, enlarged Europe may be economically and politically inevitable. But it is surey, morally, compulsory?


It is clear that for the peoples of the former Eastern bloc, the Nice Treaty is the best and final escape hatch from the secluded politics of the Cold War and the residual, cultural and economic isolation of the Iron Curtain. Today, those peoples look West to Ireland - to the remotest corner of the continent, in the hope that we will do the decent thing two days from now, and let them in. For months now, I have brought their case to the four corners of my country. I am hopeful that on Saturday, we will extend to our brothers and sisters in the East, those priceless principles: Liberté, Fraternité, Egalité. Collectively, as a new community, we will, all of us, be the richer for it.


A colonial history, in which every generation of Irishmen and Irishwomen rebelled, has left Ireland deeply suspicious of anything with even the vaguest whiff of imperialism. The possible rise of the EU as a dominant Superstate, a kind of Euro Empire, has been not just a concern to our electorate, but one of the more serious falsehoods peddled by the No-to-Nice campaign. In fact, the advent of so many new small states to the EU, will lead to a latter-day Reformation, taking out of the ‘big mind’ of Europe, replacing it with the individual consciousness of Ireland, of Latvia, of Malta, of Slovenia, of Lithuania. That will guarantee the diversity that is the lifeblood of working democracy in the Union. Today, as the Union prepares for the next phase of integration process, I urge you to continue to respect the position of our small, member states.

In 1995, when I was Ireland’s Minister for Trade, I had the pleasure of meeting delegations from a number of the candidate countries. They showed steely resolve to meet the tough criteria necessary for accession to the EU. For many of them, the journey to even considering EU membership, carried both political and personal risk. But, what was most striking at the time, was how readily these countries took Ireland as their role model. I heard over nd over - ‘if Ireland can do it, so can we’. This view was echoed by Lech Walesa yesterday and Vaclev Havel when they publicly appealed to the Irish people to support the Nice Treaty. So, as I have said all over Ireland in the last months, campaigning for that vital YES vote to the Nice Treaty: who are we now to keep some of them out?


Fine Gael, as a member of the European Peoples Party for nearly 30 years, has always believed in the potential of the European Union - politically, economically and socially. When other Irish parties prophesied ‘Euro-doom’, Fine Gael willingly embraced the inclusive philosophy of Schuman, Adenauer and de Gasperi. We believed: Ireland prospered. And, it will continue to prosper in an enlarged EU.


Economically, we have our eyes fixed firmly on the additional 130-million new consumers for our goods and services. Socially, we welcome the opportunity to live and work in ten new, member countries. Politically, we see enlargement sustaining peace, harmony, and therefore prosperity, in the fledgling democracies of Eastern Europe. As a nation that has lived with the generational curse of forced economic migration, we know the joy of being able to live and rear our families at home, for a change. Others should know it too. Is it not, after all, a basic civil, even human right?


The Irish people also want to play our part in reuniting the peoples of Europe who have been separated by war and oppression for 60 years. It is only through a strong, enlarged European Union that lasting peace and stability throughout this continent can be secured.


The referendum debate in Ireland has been an opportunity for us to put forward a positive view of Ireland’s role in the Union. It has also allowed us to lay to rest many of the myths and red-herrings peddled by those who oppose the Nice Treaty. It highlighted, further, a number of issues of genuine concern to our citizens; including the perceived democratic deficit, bureaucracy, large-state dominance and immigration. If w are to continue to build public support for the integration process, we must be conscious of these concerns and endeavour to address them.


Through active participation, engagement and leadership, small countries like Ireland, can play a critical role in the new EU. I would like to see Ireland develop its tremendous capacity to be a coalition builder. With 75 years of statehood under our belt, we can talk credibly and confidently to emerging democracies, about issues such as constitutional development and the containment and resolution of civil conflict. From the ashes of the Civil War we became a successful, wealthy country. We achieved that success, primarily, by being members of the European Union.


On Saturday, we will vote to give others the same chance. Today, they look to us, and us alone, to let them in to what we say, at least, is the heartland of human freedom, dignity and democracy. And who are we to keep them out?


Ireland must, as a nation, say YES. To do otherwise would see the second Irish referendum become an aide-memoire to the initial destabilization of the continent – the continent that I want to see become a powerful, peaceful, independent, compassionate, Europe.