Opposition says Ahern was conned on Nice Treaty

Opposition leaders have rebuked the Taoiseach over the Nice Treaty. The Labour party leader, Mr Ruairi Quinn, said the decision on the Commission's size was a "travesty" and Mr Ahern had been "conned", while the Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, said his party would never have conceded losing a Commissioner for a five-year period.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, dismissed Mr Bruton's comments as "cant" and asked of Mr Quinn what message would have been sent to the accession countries if Ireland vetoed the Treaty of Nice. He said Ireland held a hard negotiating line on each of the issues and had fought harder than most, if not all.

The Taoiseach said the outcome was a "victory for the Union and applicant states". During a debate on the outcome of the summit, Mr Ahern said he was "very satisfied with the outcome on the Commission, which guarantees the Irish Government's right to nominate a Commissioner for the next decade or longer" and to have secured the right to equal rotation thereafter.

He said media reports described the Nice outcome as a "victory for Ireland" but he would rather consider the treaty as a "victory for the Union and the applicant states".

Mr Quinn said that no matter how well intentioned the Taoiseach was, what was agreed and conceded by the Taoiseach was a "travesty ".

He said he had consistently pointed out that "the taxation issue was a Trojan horse, a phoney war, set up to draw the Taoiseach's fire and he gave it all."

EU taxation harmony was "never going to happen", given the strength of feeling on taxation harmonisation.

Mr Bruton said that Mr Ahern would be remembered as conceding the right to a Commissioner.

Mr Trevor Sargent (Green, Dublin North) was "disappointed and alarmed" at the Nice summit outcome, including the "erosion of basic principles".