Nice referendum no time to play opportunistic politics with Europe

Our current prosperity is heavily dependent on our exports, and those, in turn, are facilitated by international goodwill. It would be an awful mistake to risk that goodwill by blocking the accession of the applicant countries from Eastern Europe.

The arguments being used by the anti-Nice brigade are the same old arguments that they have been using since 1972. They are still arguing that it would supposedly be a threat to our neutrality, to our sovereignty, and to God knows what else. These are the same people.

Sinn Fein is still there. Back in 1972 the Labour Party and the trade union movement were on the anti side, but they at least have learned from their past mistake.

The most frightening aspect of the referendum debate is the number of supposedly intelligent people who are talking about voting “No” as a protest against the Taoiseach or the government. This is usually what the opposition does, but at least on these occasions the main opposition parties are lined up behind the government in the national interest.

The referendum should not be about personalities, much less the selfish political opportunism that has bedeviled our politics since the foundation of the state. It is time that we learn from those mistakes.

In 1921 when Michael Collins and company brought back the Treaty, de Valera opposed it, more to demonstrate that he was in charge than anything else. Collins challenged him to produce an alternative, and de Valera came up with an alternative that included the partition clauses of the Treaty verbatim. He candidly admitted to a private session of the Dáil that there was only a shadow of a difference between the Treaty and what he wanted.

It was “a small difference” over “that little sentimental thing,” he said. The difference was so small that the British would not fight for it.

Collins said the British would but it was not worth fighting over, because they could get what they wanted without resorting to war, by simply using the Treaty as a setting stone.

The Treaty argument was over whether Ireland would be a full member inside the British Commonwealth, or be outside and associated with the British Commonwealth with all the powers and responsibilities as if the country were inside. They fought the civil war over that issue, and it poisoned Irish political life for most of the remainder of the century.

When de Valera returned to power in 1932 he admitted that he had underestimated the benefits of the Treaty.

In other words, that small difference was even smaller than he had thought.

By then it was the turn of WT Cosgrave to play the part of the spoiler. When de Valera tried to use the stepping stone approach advocated by Collins, Cosgrave secretly pleaded with the British to block him. The British responded by waging the Economic War from 1932 to 1938.

Thus, both the Civil War and the Economic War were the products of destructive politics in which the opposition sought to embarrass the government for purely selfish political reasons, without regard to the national interest.

In fairness to WT Cosgrave he paved the way for keeping this country out of the second world war by not playing politics with that issue for a change.

His son, Liam, also refused to play politics with the Northern issue when it blew up in the early 1970.

In November 1972 when Des O’Malley introduced an amendment to the Offences Against the State Act, which would allow a senior garda to give evidence in court about a belief that an accused was a member of the IRA. Aspects of the 1939 legislation conflicted with the European Convention on Human Rights, so the Offences Against the State Act had to be amendment in order that senior gardaí were would be permitted to give such hearsay evidence.

Many of those previously convicted had been released by the appeal courts, and few convictions would be secured, unless senior gardaí were allowed to give their opinions as evidence. It would still be up to the courts to decide whether or not to believe that hearsay evidence.

Liam Cosgrave had often said, as Fine Gael leader, that his party would give the government whatever support was needed to deal with the problem. Cosgrave wished to uphold his promise, but it looked like it would cost him his leadership, because too many of his party colleagues were determined to exploit the situation for party advantage.

Among those leading the revolt within Fine Gael were the future Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald, and the future Chief Justice TF O’Higgins. Another future Taoiseach, John Bruton, then a backbencher, was among their supporters. The Fine Gael Parliamentary Party voted by 38 to eight to oppose the legislation. After that vote, six of those supporting Cosgrave switched their votes, leaving Cosgrave with the support of just one deputy.

“This party has always stood by any Government no matter how much it is opposed to it, which acting properly and with due process, seek to protect the liberties and lives of our people and the society in which we live,” Garret FitzGerald had told the Dáil in August 1971. But now that there was a political advantage to be gained, he and his colleagues were acting differently.

A couple of bombs went off in Dublin, however, and Fine Gael suddenly realised that it was no time to play politics. Cosgrave “was widely seen as the hero of the hour,” according to FitzGerald. He had “stood firm and had, in tragic circumstances, been proved right.” Had the party continued to play politics, we might well have been dragged into the Northern conflict back then.

By the early 1980s the two sides were back at their old political games. With the economy going into a tailspin, Charlie Haughey tried to introduce economic reform plan, The Way Forward. But the opposition used this to bring down his government in 1982. Then, when FitzGerald tried to introduce similar policies, Haughey vigorously opposed the moves, until FitzGerald was ousted.

At that point Alan Dukes put the country first by introducing the Tallaght Strategy, which allowed the Haughey government to turn the economy around. Dukes was then gutted by colleagues within Fine Gael for that piece of patriotism, or that was how it appeared, and they have been trying to figure out ever since why people wont trust them. It may be all about power for the politicians, but for the public it should be about performance in the national interest.

People may well question Bertie Ahern’s rather feeble explanation surrounding his appointment of Ray Burke, and they may even conclude that his behaviour renders him unfit to continue as Taoiseach, but none of that has anything to do with the Nice Treaty. We should have learned about the disastrous consequences of playing opportunistic politics with major issues.

Those who are advocating that the Nice Treaty should be rejected merely to rebuff the Taoiseach are ignoring our history. If we allow such people, or their fatuous reasoning, to influence the outcome of the campaign, we will have earned, and will deserve, the contempt of Europe.