The Nice treaty boils down to the question of whether we want to be an active player in the EU or left out in the cold. It is important that we would look back at the past and see what Ireland was like before we joined the EEC. It could be said that in 1972 Ireland was still part of the United Kingdom. Even though we had gained our independence in 1921 and declared a Republic in the late 1940s, in effect we really were still a part of the United Kingdom. Two thirds of our trade was with the UK and we shared a common labour market. Our currency was simply a derivative of sterling and, consequently, we had no need for separate monetary or exchange rate policies. Interest rates were determined in London. Agriculture was almost totally dependent on the British market. Manufacturing exports went predominantly into the UK and our external commercial policy was designed to accommodate that of Britain. Ireland was isolated from the rest of Europe and we were a politically independent region of the British economy. On the eve of EEC membership, Irish living standards were 62% of the European average and, more graphically, about one third of what they are today. Even going back to the mid-1950s, emigration was so high that an American socialist wrote credibly of the vanishing Irish.