SINN FÉIN:A BETTER deal is possible if Irish voters reject the Lisbon Treaty next month, Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams, suggested at the weekend.
Despite reassurances that the concerns of the electorate since the treaty’s rejection last year had been addressed, Mr Adams said people would still be voting on the same treaty.
“We will still lose our commissioner, only now in 2014 instead of 2009,” he said. “Our neutrality will still be undermined. Workers’ rights and public services will still come under attack and tax harmonisation will still be made easier.
“For our part the fact that exactly the same treaty is being placed before the people means that we should give the same answer. A better deal is still possible, but only if we reject the Lisbon Treaty on October 2nd.”
Mr Adams said that despite its opposition to the treaty, his party’s European policy was positive and progressive. “Sinn Féin believes that Ireland’s place is at the heart of Europe,” he said outside a Sinn Féin ard comhairle meeting in Dublin.
“Our approach to the EU is to support those proposals that are in Ireland’s interests and to oppose and campaign to change those that are not.”
Meanwhile, Richard Greene, a spokesman for anti-treaty group Cóir, claimed that a No vote on Lisbon would save jobs and protect workers rights.
He said this was based on judgments by the European Court of Justice that allowed employers in one EU state to take on workers from another state at lower rates.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio, Mr Greene also insisted Cóir adhered to all funding regulations and had received no money from overseas.
“We have not got one cent from overseas, we have not got one cent from big business . . . We will take money from anywhere we can get it, in accordance with the law.”
Separately, Éirígí, the socialist republican organisation and a critic of Sinn Féin, launched its own campaign against the treaty in Dublin on Saturday.
Spokesman Daithí Mac an Mháistir said the group planned to bring to tens of thousands of doorsteps the message that “the EU is not working”.
“The establishment political parties, Ibec and big business – the very people who have led this country into economic ruin – are asking people to vote Yes,” he said.
