Joe McHugh (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister of State to the House and commend the all-party leadership shown in the recent Nice referendum. I congratulate in particular Deputy John Bruton and our Leader, Deputy Kenny, who had the vision and foresight to realise this was not a political mission. As it was in the interests of the people we decided to leave politics out of it.

I would like to refer to the parochial element of Donegal in light of the recent referendum where 64% of the people decided not to vote. I pre-empted this when I spoke to the Minister about the issue prior to the referendum and I also mentioned it to the MEP, Pat Cox. Some 64% of people in Donegal, a regional peripheral location, probably one of the most peripheral regions of the European project, locked in between Northern Ireland and bordering just a seven mile stretch with the Republic, decided that the European project was meaningless. They felt completely disenfranchised as was shown in the democratic deficit in the recent referendum. Lessons must be learned from this. There will be other referenda when the same scaremongering will take place about the democratic deficit. Rather than being critical, we should be constructive. We should consider seriously proposals from the committee of regions and the assembly of European regions where there is serious talk about subsidiarity, regional autonomy and giving more power and responsibility to local authorities and local regions.