Fianna Fáil has launched its campaign for a Yes vote in the citizenship referendum, insisting that the Government's proposal is "simple and balanced" and that it has nothing to do with race.
The director of the party's campaign, the Minister for Family and Social Affairs, Ms Coughlan, said yesterday that the State had welcomed tens of thousands of immigrants in recent years, and would continue to do so. The proposed constitutional amendment amounted to "sensible regulation" of immigration, and would still leave Ireland as "one of the most open and welcoming countries in Europe".
The Government proposal to be voted upon on June 11th would end the current automatic constitutional right of all children born on the island of Ireland to Irish citizenship.
If passed, the Government has pledged to introduce legislation to allow citizenship to children born on the island, if at least one parent has been legally resident here for three of the four years before the child's birth.
Ms Coughlan strongly rejected claims by some opponents that this proposal is racist. "Irish citizenship has never, and will never, be based on race. The only requirement in the draft legislation relates to the length of residency in the country. There is no place for racism in our country or in this debate," she said.
She referred to the Chen case, in which the European Court of Justice last week issued a preliminary opinion that a baby, Catherine Chen, who was born in Belfast to a Chinese mother, had a right to reside in the UK on the basis of being an Irish, and therefore an EU, citizen.
The preliminary judgment stated further that Catherine Chen's mother could invoke a right of UK residency derived from her daughter's right.
Ms Coughlan claimed that this "highlighted the fact that having a Irish-born child is a passport to residency in the wider Europe".
In response to questions, Minister of State Brian Lenihan agreed that the judgment had said she could only do this on the basis that she had private health insurance and could show she had her own means, and would therefore not be a burden on any EU state.
While conceding that this significantly narrowed the number of people who could avail of this judgment - if it is upheld in the court's final ruling - he said there was still the possibility of a substantial number of people coming to Ireland to give birth and to avail of the citizenship laws here.
Mr Lenihan said he was encouraged that Fine Gael was also urging a Yes vote.
He said Ireland was no longer a country of emigration but of strong immigration. "About 200,000 non-nationals are living here, the vast majority of them legally and they are welcome," he said.
Ms Coughlan emphasised that a Yes vote would not remove Irish citizenship from anyone who now possesses it.