"There's blacks in this country getting the best of everything," Fianna Fáil TDSean Fleming was told as he went looking for Yes votes for Nice, writes Carol Coulter
The canvass got off to a bad start.Seeking a rural part of the Laois-Offaly constituency, Sean Fleming, accompanied by local party activist and former Portlaoise town councillor Tom Colgan, started on a road outside Portlaoise. We stopped at a cottage beside the road with a number of second-hand cars parked in the yard. A cacophony of barking broke out when we knocked.
A thick-set middle-aged man opened the door. "I'm voting No," he said, as soon as he saw the leaflet.
"We fought long enough for the independence of this country, and I don't want foreigners running it now.
"There's blacks in this country getting the best of everything. Put them all in a cattle ship and ship them out. There's f***ing niggers in this town coming out to me and buying cars off me with money from the health board. They're all driving around in big cars."
Sean Fleming interjected that a lot of immigrants came legally from England, where they had bank accounts, and they could draw money out of ATM machines. The man was having none of it.
"This country took long enough to get on its feet. Mary MacAleese . . . is it Mary MacAleese? Mary Somebody, would let any stray dog into Ireland."
Sean Fleming gave up, commenting as he left: "The only hope is he won't vote. But you notice he took the money off them for the cars all the same."
Across the road the reaction was more positive. A farmer about to check on his stock said to Fleming: "You might be lucky with it this time. I don't know how it'll go, but I'll give you a vote."
There were many like the man in a neighbouring house who said they were confused, though not quite as confused as last time.
"There's not a lot in it for us voting Yes," the TD admitted. "But if we don't vote Yes there's a down-side. A lot of US companies are in Ireland because we are the only English-speaking country with the euro. If we vote No again they might wonder if they should relocate."
The man was persuaded, and said he would vote Yes.
A young man in the house up the road had just arrived home from working on the expansion of the Intel plant outside Dublin - one of the hundreds commuting between Laois and Dublin daily.
He was sceptical about the argument that US firms might leave if there was a No vote.
"I think Intel have invested enough in Ireland, they won't move too easily," he said. His father was out in the milking parlour, but, not having the boots needed to get him through the slurry, the townie canvassers decided to leave him be.
The man at the next house admitted to voting No the last time and called his wife out to hear the arguments.
Sean Fleming told them that this time there would be a constitutional referendum to ensure that Ireland would not join a European army. A No vote could also damage our negotiating position in Europe. But the couple seemed most swayed by his argument that it would be selfish to prevent other countries from getting the advantages from the EU that Ireland had got.
In the village of Ballyroan Stephanie Whelan runs the local pub with her husband. She is also the secretary of the local Fianna Fáil cumann, and she was worried.
"The biggest fear you'd have is that people would tie this up with Flood. But the pub is the worst place to be talking to people," she said.
"In the talk in the pub everything is mixed up - the Exchequer figures, the Budget coming up, fear of taxing children's allowances. And the young people couldn't give two hoots about it."
Sean Fleming felt the electorate was intelligent enough to separate disillusionment with the Government from the Nice referendum, and pointed to how the electorate had voted the last time, when it voted Yes on the abolition of the death penalty and the International Criminal Court, while rejecting Nice.
This view was tested in Portlaoise town, when we canvassed Tom Colgan's home estate of Baladd, made up of solid, detached bungalows. The residents were mainly middle-aged, many of them prison officers, gardaí or hospital workers.
"I'm going to vote Yes, but you're a very brave man, coming out," one woman said. "I'll give you 10 out of 10 for calling."
"Why?"
"With all that's going on. People are getting to think, 'I'm not going to vote for them.' I know you're saying the truth, but, really and truly, who do you trust? Are the fees going to come back for third level?"
"The Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have said they won't," the canvasser replied.
"The Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have said things before," the woman responded.
"And she's a Fianna Fáil voter," Tom Colgan said as we left.
One man was worried about the Germans, helped by the French and the Italians, taking over Europe. Others, however, assured the TD they were voting Yes.
In this estate also myths about immigrants were rife. One woman said she knew for definite about a "coloured" woman coming into the most expensive hairdresser's in Portlaoise, having her hair done, and ringing up the health board to get it to pay.
She contrasted this with what her son has to pay to have treatment for his asthma, and the speed of the hospital in sending out bills when he was hospitalised.
Sean Fleming offered advice on the health charges, and was firm in denying the story about the hairdresser.
"You're about the fourth person to tell me about the woman getting €100 for a hairstyle. I'm going to get the health board to issue a statement."
Other TDs had the same stories, he told The Irish Times. Despite being without foundation, they seemed to spread from town to town.