A Fianna Fáil backbench TD yesterday accused the Government of "lack of decisive leadership" and sending "a garbled, scrambled message" to the electorate in the run-up to the Nice Treaty referendum.
Mr John McGuinness, Carlow-Kilkenny TD and a former mayor of Kilkenny, said the Cabinet and Ministers of State were jeopardising the Yes campaign by engaging in "spurious debates" on the state of the public finances. Such "unhelpful" debates included those on the proposed reintroduction of third level education fees, and the possible taxation of the children's allowance, both of which he said he opposed.
More importantly, however, he said, "all of this debate on these issues is simply taking the focus from the Nice referendum".
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, he said: "Disunity is obvious, and it is a fact that the Cabinet seem to be all over the place judging by press reports, and so on. But it's still within time to draw the Cabinet back into line, to draw their thinking on the economy back into line, and to begin to explain more to the electorate.
"We constantly say that we have a very intelligent electorate but I'm afraid that some members of the Cabinet certainly are not treating them that way.
"It is about time that we got a clear economic message out, that we got a message out about Flood (the tribunal), and that we dealt with the central issue here which is the Nice Treaty. And unfortunately the message is quite scrambled at present."
Clarifying his views later to The Irish Times, Mr McGuinness said "There is a lack of decisive leadership. I don't know anyone who would allow a Cabinet to go into spurious debates about whether a cut is an adjustment or an adjustment a cut. That is pure nonsense.
"I support Bertie Ahern. But he is a consensus politician who has to have regard for decisive leadership."
He added his views reflected "a lot of feeling" within the Parliamentary Party, members of which were concerned at not having met properly to discuss the new-found position of the Irish economy since the election.
Of the Parliamentary Party meeting in Killarney last month, he said it "turned out to be more of a roadshow and dealing with the media than dealing with the real, serious issues of the day".
He urged the Government to "draw a temporary line in the sand" on the economy by explaining what people could expect in the way of cuts. "They want to know where these are going to fall. They want to ensure that the marginalised in our society are not hurt any further. We need to be truthful with the electorate, and give them a clear understanding that at least we know where we are going."
Saying the referendum was "on a knife-edge", Mr McGuinness also urged the Taoiseach to get the Cabinet together and "face them in the one direction" rather than have them issuing conflicting statements on what should or should not be done on the economy.
