Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein)

That the Government is engaged in making threats to secure the passing of the referendum on the treaty is nothing new. We have become well used to being cajoled or bribed into supporting successive moves in the ceding of Irish sovereignty to the European Union. People will recall the wonderful promises made in the course of the first Lisbon treaty referendum campaign. Its passing, we were assured, would usher in a new era of plenty. We were told to "Vote Yes for Jobs". All that now sounds rather hollow as, under the terms of the bailout programme, the European Union has become anything but a fairy godmother. What we also learned in the Lisbon treaty referendum campaign was that the elite in this state and Brussels literally did not take "No" for an answer. The democratic decision of the people was not accepted and we had a second Lisbon treaty referendum but with fewer promises and more threats. In the current environment there are few promises, as can clearly be seen by comparing what the Government is doing with what it promised to do during the general election campaign and in the programme for Government. The threat is no longer implied but starkly outlined: the choice is to vote "Yes" or face even worse times ahead.

The fact that the Government has signed up to the treaty is a further illustration of the extent to which it has surrendered to the politics and economics of austerity. It also strives to give the impression that there is a consensus in favour of the treaty and that there is no alternative to it. In doing so it is ignoring a wide range of opinion across Irish society that opposes the politics and economics of austerity and instead supports a positive programme of utilising our own initiative and resources to stimulate growth.

It is somewhat ironic that on this issue the Labour Party is being outflanked on the left by respected members of the business community. I listened yesterday morning to what Mr. John Teeling, former owner of Cooley Distillery, had to say and do not believe he was a participant in the Occupy Dame Street campaign. He was making the same perfectly logical point my party, the trade union movement and a raft of economists have been making for the past few years - that austerity does not work. This has been proved historically and is being proved every passing day in the State, as the negative multiplier effect of taking money out of the economy leads to further business closures, higher unemployment and further social decline. The alternative is to simulate the economy through investment which needs to be led by the State, rather than, as it is proposing to do, by shedding public companies and withdrawing more capital.

Mr. Teeling has also proposed that the State defer debt payments for the next six years and use the money saved and the window of opportunity that would open to get the economy back on its feet. However, such a proposal would be greeted with horror by the European Central Bank and the Government will do nothing to offend it. We seem content to genuflect every time it opens its mouth. What we are being offered instead is an endless vista of austerity, with even worse to come if we do not cede further powers to the European Union by passing the treaty.

While I do not expect the Members opposite to agree with Sinn Féin on the treaty, I urge them to support the call made in the motion not to ratify the amended Article 136 or the ESM treaty until after we have had a debate on the referendum free of these issues.

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