"Pillars of society" in Galway who failed to exercise their franchise in the last Nice Treaty referendum have been urged to get out and vote Yes this time.
At a Fianna Fáil press conference in Galway yesterday, the Minister of State for Labour Affairs and Training, Mr Frank Fahey, said that while he did not want to specify any particular "pillars", he had observed the high-profile abstentions from the electoral register.
"You'd be surprised at the number," he added. The register he examined was the "informal" one kept by party personation officers, who are always present at polling booths, he explained.
A full record of those who did and didn't vote was now freely available to any member of the public, on disk, through the Freedom of Information Act, the Minister of State said. "People we had expected to vote just didn't", Mr Fahey added.
"We don't know how they voted, of course," his party colleague, Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture and Food, Mr Noel Treacy, interjected.
The party's director of elections for the referendum in Galway West, the Minister for Rural, Community and Family Affairs, Mr Ó Cuív, added his voice of disapproval.
"There is no point in blaming people who did come out last time and vote No, when there are those who didn't come out at all," he said. However, Mr Ó Cuiv also said he was surprised that the No voters had not "moved on" when they had "got what they wanted" after the last result.
"I again want to reiterate that it was not the content of the Nice Treaty which made me vote No last time. My No vote was a vote that primarily was one of concern on the future neutrality of this country, on the way that European affairs were being dealt with in this country, on our long term goals regarding the future of Europe and on tax harmonisation.
"In the last 15 months my concerns have been comprehensively addressed, and I am now calling on the voters of Galway and the west to vote Yes to Nice," he said.
"Along with the setting up of the Forum on Europe and a new Oireachtas process of scrutiny of new EU legislation, our neutrality has now been completely safeguarded with the strongest protection ever." He added: "The Seville Declaration and the proposed new wording of the amendment has made this possible."
A public meeting on the Nice treaty was hosted by Fine Gael in Galway city last night as part of its campaign for a Yes vote.
