The public's response to the Nice Treaty carried a seminal message for Michael Noonan. Fine Gael had joined with the establishment parties in cosy advocacy of a Yes vote and had been overwhelmed by johnny-come-latelies. He didn't want that to happen again. Better to stand aloof. Especially when Bertie Ahern came bearing gifts.
Weary of consensus politics, wary of the motivations of Mr Ahern, the new Fine Gael leader has now refused to participate in a long-running National Forum on Europe. The body, to be established in September, was intended to review Ireland's rejection of the Nice Treaty and debate the future development of the European Community.
But, while Michael Noonan kicked the door shut on "a three-year talking shop in Dublin Castle", he softened the rejection by offering to participate in a short, three-month rescue attempt for the Nice Treaty. Fine Gael was very much a pro-Europe party, he intimated, but it wasn't going to be used as a political mudguard by Fianna Fail.
It was all about tactics and strategy. Mr Noonan wasn't going to be smothered in the cloying embrace of Fianna Fail in the run-up to a general election, now less than a year away. As much distance as possible should separate them. He was not going to allow Mr Ahern disguise the fissures within the Coalition Government over Europe by engaging in a long-running, all-party forum. Fianna Fail and the Government would have to sort out their own problems.
"My job," Mr Noonan told journalists on Wednesday, "is to provide an alternative government to Fianna Fail, with different policies and a commitment to run the country in a different way." Northern Ireland was an area in which they could continue to have consensus. But there would have to be differences elsewhere. Fine Gael would offer choices to the people, he said, because there was a widespread feeling the public had been taken for granted in Nice. In that regard, any new national agreement with the social partners would have to be more broadly based and reflect European social standards, including commitments to greater spending on health, education and welfare.
But the basic message was that Fine Gael would not be sucked into any more consensual arrangements with Fianna Fail. The Taoiseach was far too sharp an operator to trust. To emphasise the point, Mr Noonan recalled that, a year ago, Fine Gael had participated in an all-party committee on abortion that proposed a fund of £50 million be established to reduce the number of crisis pregnancies. Nothing had happened. "This discourages Fine Gael from investing time and energy in working with you to achieve consensus on other issues," he said.
Ruairi Quinn expressed "surprise and regret" at the Fine Gael decision. The forum had, of course, been a long-running Labour Party idea. But the Coalition Government had accepted the need for an extensive public debate only after the electorate had given the thumbs down to Nice.
The point of the forum, Mr Quinn declared, was to provide clarity, not consensus, about the issues involving our constitutional and political relationships within an enlarged and developing Europe. There was, he said, a real need to have such a public debate in advance of the Intergovernmental Conference in 2004.
Having refused to play footsie with Mr Ahern over corporate funding - it rejected an invitation to participate in an all-party committee on political donations - the Labour Party could understand where Fine Gael was coming from. But it still regarded Mr Noonan's approach as "unstatesmanlike", given the importance of the issue.
The Taoiseach, just back from Brazil, was taking it easy. Never a man to reject half a loaf if the alternative was no bread, Mr Ahern kept his eye firmly on Mr Noonan's offer to discuss those issues that might form the basis for a second referendum on Nice. And he suggested there might be room to expand this framework through further discussion with the parties. After all, he said, the idea for debates in all member-states on the future of Europe had come from the European Commission.
The Government, he said yesterday, would reflect on the situation and get back to Fine Gael and the Labour Party on the matter.
Michael Noonan wasn't worried. With a by-election win under his belt and the ground cleared for a more abrasive approach to Government policies in the autumn, he was coasting. Debate on the future shape and structure of Europe could always be dealt with in the Dail. Alternatively, the Seanad could lead public discussion and become "a European House".
One way or another, there is a considerable distance to go before all-party agreement emerges on the nature and extent of a forum debate on Europe.