Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)

-----the referendum of "Show me the money". It is the question that those who are against this treaty must answer. Those who are looking for the passage of this treaty are able to answer it by saying that the State, if need be - we do not believe it will happen - would have access to a fund in the future. We are able to say that if this treaty is passed, it will make it easier for the State to access funding in the financial markets as well. People who are looking to reject this treaty cannot answer that question. They can offer options and theories but they cannot offer a concrete plan regarding how the State would be able to fund essential public services. We have already seen the convulsions that have been caused in our society, community and economy when we get ourselves to a place where first the banks and then the State are unable to borrow or find the money to fund the services upon which people depend. The question that has to be asked is which vote in this referendum gives us the best chance of avoiding that vista recurring, and of avoiding a situation where the State cannot borrow to fund the services people rely on. The answer to that question is to vote "Yes".

This morning I saw an example of the need for this during a meeting of the sub-committee of the Committee on European Affairs that has been set up to look at this issue. People come in to the sub-committee and say we should vote "No" because options will become available and there are potentially other ways in which we can fund our services. Options, theories and possibilities are not good enough when we come to the question of how we would fund the social welfare payments that people need.

I want to deal with the options that have been put forward. The first option put forward is that if the ECB and the European Commission will not fund us, the IMF will. What I find extraordinary about this argument is that the very people putting forward this case are the same ones who have been writing books and making speeches decrying and criticising the role of the IMF in imposing conditions on other countries, with this conditionality having, it is claimed, a devastating impact elsewhere. These same people now come forward to say the IMF will support us. Does anybody really think the IMF, in an environment in which this country votes "No", is going to move away from the need to impose conditions on a country that is looking for funding? More importantly, do they think the IMF will operate within the eurozone without the support of the European Central Bank and the European Commission? If one looks at the recent track record of the IMF in any country, let alone the eurozone, the answer to that question is surely "No".

The second point put forward concerns the idea of conditionality in regard to Article 136. It is suggested it is not right that conditions should be put upon people who look to access the European Stability Mechanism. However, the ESM in a number of years will include our money in that the money going into that fund will come from the Irish taxpayer in order to be deployed in other countries. Is anybody seriously suggesting it is in the best interest of the Irish taxpayer not to have conditions regarding how our money is used in other countries? If they believe the answer to that question is that those conditions should not be there, they need to say to the Irish taxpayer why they will be happy in future for their money to be spent elsewhere without conditions attached. It is surely in our interest now and in the future for such conditions to be in place.

The third argument I hear is that if we vote "No" we will increase our options in the future. Of course, what this does not recognise is that other countries will by then have already ratified this programme, for example, Portugal has already done so. If we were in an environment in which our support was needed for this programme to go ahead and for this treaty to be ratified, of course, an argument that new options would be generated would hold water. However, our support is not needed for this treaty to come into force.

To conclude, those people who argue that defeat of this treaty will increase options for our country are surely not acknowledging the reality that our country will find itself in a situation where access to marketplace funding is more difficult, if not impossible, and access to a support mechanism, if we need it, is ruled out. That does not equal an increase in the options available to our people but instead reduces them to the state that further crisis is inevitable. That is what we have to avoid.

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