Border controls dominate a xenophobic and narrow debate on treaty referendum

John Rasmussen leans against the frontier post in his border guard's uniform

John Rasmussen leans against the frontier post in his border guard's uniform. Behind him is a huge lorry containing God knows what - but that is the point the leader of the border guards union is making in an advertisement against the Amsterdam Treaty. He and his colleagues are Denmark's last line of defence against the outside world; out there are criminals, immigrants, foreigners . . .

The ad tells readers that Rasmussen cannot conceive of Denmark's borders coming down. Every second drug arrest, he says, and every third arrest of smugglers of illegal immigrants is set in train by a tip-off from him and his colleagues. "Vote No".

Denmark is consumed by a debate on the Amsterdam Treaty whose emphasis could hardly be more different (though just as technical) to Ireland's.

While some campaigners are singing off the same hymn-sheets with talk of loss of sovereignty and Brussels bureaucracy, most voters tomorrow will be most preoccupied not with neutrality but whether Denmark should sign up to the abolition of passport controls with the rest of the EU.

READ MORE

In some respects, the country's dilemma on the issue recalls Ireland's last year during the treaty negotiations: Denmark is part of the Nordic passport union which allows citizens of the three Nordic EU members and Norway to travel freely to each other's countries. Opting out of Schengen completely would mean losing that privilege.

Denmark has had an opt-out from the decision-making structures of the Schengen agreement but the government wants to take part in the treaty's implementation - in practice this means Denmark must accept the rules set up under Schengen without participating in their formulation.

The result is a political gift to the treaty opponents of both left and right. The right-wing Danish People's Party insists the consequence will be an unchecked flood of immigrants across the border while the left attacks the democratic deficit involved. They make uncomfortable bedfellows.

The re-elected Social Democrat government of Mr Poul Nyrup Rasmusssen has been playing an almost Eurosceptical game to this most Eurosceptical of countries, arguing that Schengen will facilitate the fight against illegal immigration by strengthening external border controls.

He insists that Amsterdam, which he helped to negotiate, represents only a minor loss of sovereignty, but is the end of the road as far as the federalising tendencies of the Union are concerned.

Few doubt that the treaty would have been defeated had his election rival, Mr Uffe Ellemann Jensen, an enthusiastic Europhile, been elected, whereas the cautious Mr Nyrup Rasmussen is seen as unlikely to move ahead of public opinion.

That has to be weighed against the uncertain effects of the recent general strike over pay which has led to disenchantment among traditional Social Democrat voters with their government. Most political journalists predict a Yes win, but Information's Rasmus Helveg Petersen warns that a 3-1 split in favour of the Nos in the current Don't Knows would be enough to secure them a victory.

The dreary debate has its critics. Denmark's former veteran ambassador to the EU, Mr Niels Ers boell, said he was "ashamed at the level of the debate. It is as if we Danes think Denmark is the only country in the world and that anything anybody else has to say has no interest."