The Taoiseach Mr Ahern tonight launched a rallying call to his Fianna Fáil party faithful in the face of this week's referendum setback for the Government's efforts to tighten constitutional barriers to abortion.
His keynote speech at the Fianna Fail Ardfheis in Dublin concentrated on his government’s achievements over the past five years - and overlooked this week's defeat at the polls.
Mr Ahern's address also included an evident plea to Sinn Féin to relax their attitude on policing in Northern Ireland.
Mr Ahern said that his government’s tenure was the "the longest and most stable" record in Ireland's peacetime history and had met challenges "with courage and with confidence," maintaining:
- Peace has been won and is being sustained
- Employment has been massively increased and emigration from these shores has ended
- Poverty is being tackled and social progress is being achieved
- And taxes have been cut and living standards have risen.
He added: "In the last five years, a lot has been achieved for Ireland. Tonight I say to all the people of Ireland: Together let us finish the job.
"Our record is - Prosperity, Progress and Peace. We can all be proud to run on that record in the next election."
Mr Ahern pointed in particular to advances made in Northern Ireland while his government had been in office.
But he stressed that the fundamental challenge over the next five years had to be a secure and consolidate lasting peace, end any uncertainty over the future of the Good Friday Agreement and work to improve the atmosphere between the communities."
Mr Ahern directed a clear plea at Sinn Féin to change their attitude towards policing in the North.
He said: "We need a kinder, gentler republicanism.
"The politics of confrontation, the politics of street protest, the politics of noncooperation with the new police service of Northern Ireland, the politics of slow progress in putting weapons beyond use, is the kind of politics that places the future stability of the agreement and the cross-community consent needed to surround it, under some continuing strain.
"We know that for the peace process to be ultimately successful, that momentum must be maintained.
"Therefore, we in Fianna Fáil will continue to encourage former revolutionary parties to complete their transformation sooner rather than later - to become strictly democratic ones, with no military wings."
In a reference to the situation in interface parts of Belfast, Mr Ahern added: "It cannot be right that people professing the Christian faith should need to be segregated by high walls from each other for their own safety.
"The Good Friday Agreement proclaims `the right to freedom from sectarian harassment.'
"Fianna Fáil will always work for better, more civilised relations on this island. We ask that others should do the same."
He appealed to loyalists to have more confidence in their future and to look constructively at the possibilities of partnership, pledging: "We in Fianna Fáil will not be found wanting."
PA