Lisbon is nothing to be afraid of - Kenny

Last chance saloon for Lisbon Treaty


Enda Kenny calls on his fellow Mayo people to back the treaty but Declan Ganley says it will not save one job

Anton McNulty

THE FINE Gael leader and Mayo TD, Enda Kenny, has said the Lisbon Treaty is ‘nothing to be afraid of’and called on the Mayo public to come out on Friday next, October 2 and give the treaty a ‘resounding’ Yes vote.
The electorate in Mayo will go to back to polling stations across the county after  overwhelmingly rejected the treaty last year.
In the last referendum held in June 2008, of the 48,625 valid votes, 30,001 (61.7 per cent) voted to reject the treaty compared to only 18,624 (38.3 per cent) who voted in favour. The percentage who voted against the treaty was one of the highest in the country but the Fine Gael leader believes the result will be different this time around among his natives.
“I do hope that people of my native county will respond to our call here in respect of this Lisbon Treaty that it changes the structures for our benefit. We have nothing to be afraid of here and everything to gain. The voters in Mayo are now leading Europe because we can set the standards. I’m happy with this treaty and that it provides  prosperity for all our children. The smaller countries will be protected and treated very fairly and will continue to benefit from Europe and with Europe.
“I do feel a lot more people are much clearer in their minds on the referendum this year because it has been explained to them and they are happy with the legal qualifications that have been given. I’ve covered nearly 6,000km travelling around the country explaining to people just how important it is and I think the people will distinguish between domestic political difficulties and Europe,” he told The Mayo News.
Deputy Kenny was in his native Castlebar last night for a public meeting in the TF Royal Theatre on Europe with George Lee TD, the former RTE Economics Editor among the speakers. Deputy Kenny said that companies had come to Ireland because of our position in Europe and it was important for the economy of all sectors that we stayed at the heart of Europe.
“Places like Coca-Cola, Baxter and Allergan are in this country for very good reasons; because of the quality of our workforce, for the fact we speak the English language, for the legal base we have and because we have the opportunity to export into a European market of 500 million people. I think the workers in these plants will want to send out a very strong message that we want to stay right at the heart of that decision making process.
“People understand that the European Central Bank have pumped in €100billion into the Irish economy in the last number of months. People understand that the single market of the EU offers this country massive potential for export for quality goods if we get our act together here.”
However, the man again heading the No campaign, Declan Ganley, who himself has Mayo roots in Achill, told The Mayo News that there is nothing in the Lisbon Treaty which will create a single job and claims it will result in more job losses.
“We are calling on people this time to join the quiet sensible majority, people who are not going to stand for lies. The biggest core message of this dishonest Yes campaign is that this Treaty will somehow be good for this country. The Lisbon Treaty will not create one job … the only job it will preserve is that of Brian Cowen.
“It will end up in resulting in job losses in this county because it moves us into the heart of the agenda of economic harmonisation across the European Union. It weakens our voice to a point where we become negligible and we will become utterly irrelevant. We will be forgotten about. This will be one of the greatest acts of self marginalisation in Irish history if we vote Yes,” he said.