THE publication of the Government's White Paper on Foreign Policy should provoke mature debate rather than "the usual base sloganeering and verbal abuse", Mr Gay Mitchell told the Fine Gael Ardfheis.
Mr Mitchell, the Minister of State responsible for European Affairs, said that debate on Ireland's future role in European security and defence had been suppressed in the past.
The ard fheis accepted his recommendation last night to vote against a motion supporting full Irish membership of the Western European Union. Party members spoke for and against the motion with Fine Gael's Dublin West by election candidate, Mr Tom Morrissey, opposing it on the grounds that such a move would compromise Ireland's neutrality.
Mr Mitchell recommended the motion be defeated because publication of the Government's White Paper imminent.
Mr Mitchell himself appeared to be indicating support for greater Irish involvement in common European defence. "We ask dour partners in the EU to show economic solidarity with us and they have done this with a massive £18 1/2 billion transfer to Ireland since 1973. Might we not at some point show some political and defence solidarity with them if they were to be attacked?"
He said there was no pressure on Ireland from its European partners to abandon neutrality. The White Paper would set out the Government's position and the outcome of any future negotiation that would involve Ireland's participation in a common defence policy would be put to the Irish people in a referendum.
The chairman of the Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs, Mr Alan Dukes, said it was odd that Ireland has "steadfastly refused to contribute actively in any way the security of our fellow citizens of the member states of the European Union".
That refusal was based on a decision made by Eamon de Valera in 1938, he said. "The world has changed but our policy has not ... continued adherence to a policy adopted in 1939 in a very different world prevents us from having a constructive role in a debate which is, however much we may dislike it, of very considerable importance, for us and for our European partners."
The ard fheis passed motions calling for a worldwide ban on the use of landmines, expressing "horror and disgust" at the treatment of children in Chinese orphanages and seeking an arms embargo on Indonesia because of the "rape, torture and murder" carried out by the Indonesian government on the people of East Timor.