EU enlargement would be one of the greatest protections we would ever have against excessive centralism in Brussels, the Minister of State for Agriculture, Food and Rural Development, Mr Eamon O Cuiv, told a debate last night in Galway, organised by anti-Nice Treaty campaign groups.
On foreign and defence policy, Mr O Cuiv said it was vital that Ireland did not get pressurised into getting involved in peace enforcement missions on every occasion but added that was not what the Nice Treaty was about.
In the debate, organised by the Peace and Neutrality Alliance, Mr O Cuiv said he had never believed Ireland should be neutral but that we should retain our traditional non-aligned position.
Another speaker was Comdt Edward Horgan, who had a distinguished military career on UN peacekeeping duties throughout the world and who is opposed to the Rapid Reaction Force proposed under the Nice Treaty.
He warned that it would be easy for Ireland to give up its neutrality but this would lead to the risk that the country could be dragged unwillingly into a world war in the future which, with modern warfare methods would result in heavy casualties.
He stressed that he was very supportive of the EU and its expansion but was concerned about the trend towards a two tier system which tended to exclude smaller and Third World countries.
Comdt Horgan said: "I have seen at first hand the value of Ireland's neutral role and the important role we have played in the past as a non-aligned country. This would be very rapidly eroded by joining a European army, which I have no doubt this Rapid Reaction Force is."
Green Party TD Mr Trevor Sargent said it was vital Irish voters were not threatened and misled into believing that a No vote spelt the end of Ireland's EU membership or the end of the enlargement of Europe. Mr Sargent pointed out that Finland and Sweden no longer described themselves as neutral, yet Ireland continued to claim neutrality despite the fact that all three countries now had the same European commitments.