With only three days to go before voting, there has been charge and counter-charge from both sides about the implications of the Nice Treaty. Opponents welcomed poll results showing an increase in their level of support while Yes campaigners preferred to stress the treaty's positive aspects.
The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, said enlargement of the European Union would provide further economic opportunities with a market of more than 100 million new customers and would contribute also to a stable Europe.
EU membership had facilitated co-operation in the fight against organised crime and this was "likely to increase and intensify over the next few years as new states join the EU as envisaged by the Treaty of Nice", the Minister said.
However, the Green MEP for Dublin, Ms Patricia McKenna, said the rise in support for the No side recorded in the Irish Times/MRBI poll was "a great achievement considering all the political establishment heavyweights are pushing for a Yes vote".
She added that the treaty was not primarily about enlargement, "but about allowing the bigger member-states to divide the EU and create a mini-state within the EU".
Mr Sean Crowe of Sinn Fein said the poll "almost certainly" underestimated the real extent of the No vote. His party had canvassed extensively over the past fortnight: "It is clear from the response on the doorsteps that a majority of the electorate intends to vote No."
Meanwhile, the Labour MEP for Dublin, Mr Proinsias De Rossa, charged that the Green Party's opposition to the treaty was "totally at variance" with the positions taken by Greens in other European countries. "It is deeply regrettable that the Irish Greens are taking such a blinkered and short-sighted perspective."
The Labour Party leader, Mr Ruairi Quinn, said Ireland should not close the door on applicant states by voting No, particularly when it had benefited so much from EU membership. "It would be a travesty of that experience if the Irish people were to vote against according the same opportunities to the countries of central and eastern Europe," Mr Quinn said.
The Minister for the Marine, Mr Fahey, said: "Nice will not lead to the birth of an EU super-state, nor will it create a European army, and it will not lead to Europe-wide tax harmonisation. It will, however, help towards uniting the diverse peoples of Europe in a spirit of peaceful co-operation and free trade."
The Fianna Fail TD, Mr Pat Carey, said the No camp was misleading the electorate by suggesting the treaty could be easily re-negotiated. "The EU has never re-negotiated a treaty and there is no evidence to suggest that it would happen on this occasion."
For the No side, the trade unionist Mr Michael O'Reilly of the ATGWU, said the treaty would lead to a "massive increase in Irish spending on defence" to the detriment of health, education and other vital public services.
Cardinal Desmond Connell said that the Irish Bishops' Conference in its statement on the treaty last week "was not calling on people to vote one way or the other". It was "certainly not a strong statement of the position one way or another", he said, and reaction to it had been "somewhat exaggerated in comment on both sides". In their statement last Thursday the bishops said that "on balance, there seems to be a stronger case for the treaty than against".