MEMBERS of the Green party narrowly voted to support the Yes side in the second Lisbon Treaty referendum at a special members' convention in Dublin yesterday.

The party voted to support the treaty by the narrowest of margins with 66.66% of the 323 voters on the yes side and 33.33% on the No side. Under party rules, a two-thirds majority was needed before it could formally commit to giving its support to the Yes side in the October referendum.

The party had narrowly failed to get the two-thirds majority in a similar vote before the first Lisbon referendum last year.

Party chairman Dan Boyle announced the result of the ballot – 214 people in favour, 107 against, with two spoilt votes – shortly after 6pm yesterday evening.

Speaking after the result, party leader John Gormley paid tribute to the party members who showed up in such numbers to contribute to "a very constructive day".

"It is an indication of the strength of this party, and the strength of this party is that we value our members' views." He paid tribute to those on the No side "because we do respect and value their opinions".

He added: "The process for the review of the programme for government has commenced today and it will now continue. Part of that process is that we continue to hear from the party members.

"It is a party that does have ideas and it is a policy based party and that is what we want to see in the review and God knows this party needs renewal and this country needs renewal."

The party has also reaffirmed its commitment to stay in coalition with Fianna Fáil. The party members will make no decision on the party's future in government until the review of the programme for government is completed in the autumn.

It is understood that the party will then hold a special 'Mansion House type' convention over the party's future, in a similar vein to a previous meeting where members approved their six TDs' entry into government in 2007.

The Minister for Communications, Eamon Ryan, told reporters: "We are in government during tough times but we are a tough party too. We are also good at talking to each other, and listening to each other to see what we can do better and do differently and the more we do that the better we will be in government.

"We are determined to do in the national interest what has to be done to get us out of these circumstances and I think we can do it. By turning our country green we can get out of this economic difficulty and prepare for a future where sustainability will have to be centre stage."

Ryan declined to go into any specifics about the Greens' demands during the review of the programme for government and said: "We are not going to be prescriptive now in terms of making decisions now that have to come in the December budget. First and foremost we are going to listen to our members' ideas."