Yes campaigners accused of arrogance

WORKERS PARTY: Michael Finnegan, president of the Workers' Party, said the response of the Yes campaign to concerns raised by citizens and those on the No side had been dismissive and reinforced the image of an undemocratic, unaccountable bureaucracy at the heart of the EU.

"There is genuine public concern about the lack of accountability in the European institutions," he said. Mr Finnegan accused the Yes campaign of responding to such concerns by dismissing them "in an arrogant, even discourteous, manner". He said the Workers' Party was more concerned about the lack of accountability of the European Commission than about its composition.

"Frankly it does not unduly worry us whether there are 27 commissioners or 15, but what does concern us is that these commissioners are accountable to nobody.

"The Lisbon Treaty does nothing to change that imbalance and the changes in the treaty concerning the European Parliament do nothing to alter it."

He said that the Yes side wanted to pretend that there were no military or foreign policy implications for Ireland contained in the Lisbon Treaty "yet that agenda was one of the few things in the treaty that was very clear".