An Open Letter to Stephen Collins (Political editor, The Irish Times)

The National Platform EU Research and Information Centre
24 Crawford Avenue
Dublin 9

Tel.: 01-8305792
Web-site nationalplatform.org

Thursday 6 August 2008

Dear Stephen,
In your Irish Times article last Saturday you call on the Government to ratify the Lisbon Treaty regardless of the 12 June referendum result.

It is strange that a political correspondent of a major national newspaper should seek to become a partisan player in the political game in this way.

Stranger still that you should be urging such a profoundly unconstitutional and undemocratic course on our political leaders.

You are mistaken if you think that Ireland can ratify the Lisbon Treaty by Oireachtas vote without a referendum.

The Lisbon Treaty, which is the EU Constitution revamped,  establishes a constitutionally new European Union, with its own legal personality for the first time, which is legally different from the present European Union that was established by the Treaty of Maastricht and which is referred to in Article 29.4  of the Irish Constitution.

The first sentence of the  Constitutional Amendment which the people rejected on 12 June proposed to replace the present Maastricht-based EU by a future Federal-style Lisbon-based EU, of which we would all be made real rather than symbolical citizens for the first time.

The same name,  “European Union”,  would be used post-Lisbon as pre-Lisbon, but the constitutional and political character of the Union, its Member States and of us as Irish citizens would be transformed fundamentally by the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty.

No Oireachtas vote is constitutionally capable of doing this.  With all due respect to you, it is irresponsible to be speading illusions otherwise.

The  Lisbon Treaty would also abolish the European Communities other than the Atomic Energy Community which we joined in 1973, and would  replace the Treaties on which they are based and  which are explicitly referred to in the Irish Constitution.  These references would have to be deleted also to enable the State to ratify Lisbon. No Oireachtas vote can do that either.

And there are several other reasons why the Constitution would have to  be amended to enable the Lisbon Treaty to be ratified.

Your article proposes an  attempt to get around the constitutional  requirement, laid down in the 1986-7 Crotty judgement of the Supreme Court, that surrenders of sovereignty to Brussels in European Treaties can only be done by the Irish people in a referendum, for they are the repositories of sovereignty.

I was myself intimately involved in the Crotty case and attended every day of the three hearings of the case: the original Injunction action before Judge Donal Barrington, the High Court stage which Raymond Crotty lost, and the Supreme Court stage which he won.

You may be interested to know that it was quite a close-run thing that Crotty did not win his court challenge to the constitutionality of the ratification procedure of the Single European Act on the ground that that Treaty’s central provisions entailed a transfer of sovereignty to Brussels, but on the narrower ground that the requirement to coordinate  foreign policy under “European Political Cooperation” entailed such a transfer.

The late Judge Henchy was the swing judge on this point in the five-man court.

Crotty’s lawyers were reliably informed at the time by sources close to the judges that Judge Henchy was anxious to find for Crotty, but that if he did so in relation to the core elements of the Single European Act which had previously been approved by Oireachtas vote, he would effectively have been finding the country’s President at the time, the late Patrick Hillery, as having failed to refer a constitutionally dubious Bill purporting to ratify the S.E.A. to the Supreme Court for assessment of its constitutionality.

Judge Henchy wanted to avoid embarrassing the President, so he approved the main provisions of the S.E.A. as having been covered by the original “license”  for Ireland to join a developing European Community, but he joined with the majority of the court in striking down the foreign policy provisions, which did not require Oireachtas approval, as being unconstitutional.

So the Crotty judgement was a highly political one amongst the five Supreme Court judges themselves!  These facts are not widely known, but I assure you they are correct.
It follows therefore that one cannot assume that the transfers of sovereignty entailed by the Lisbon Treaty would be similarly indulged by the present Supreme Court if the matter should come before it, as you implicitly propose in your article.

Judge Henchy moreover made quite clear in his own judgement in the Crotty case that if the then European Community were to move towards becoming a Political Union, a constitutional  referendum would be required here to permit that.  The European Union that would be established by the Lisbon Treaty -  which is the 2004 EU Constitution revamped -  is undoubtedly such a Political Union.

In your article you insult the No-side campaigners by saying that they were “unhampered by any allegiance to the truth”.

Truly this is the pot calling the kettle black!
I do not recollect you or your fellow Yes-side commentators alerting people during the referendum to the hugely important fact that the post-Lisbon EU would be constitutionally and politically profoundly different from the pre-Lisbon EU. . .

Or to the fact that we would be made real  citizens for the first time of this post-Lisbon EU, owing obedience to its laws and loyalty to its authority over and above our citizens’ duty to the Irish Constitution and laws. . .

Or to the fact that in the post-Lisbon EU the Irish Government would lose the right it has at present to decide who its national Commissioner would be when we have a member on the Commission, and that this would be replaced by a right to make “suggestions” only for the incoming Commission President to decide -  so replacing the present bottom-up process for appointing the Brussels Commission by a top-down one post-Lisbon . . .
Or to the fact that Lisbon proposes to restore the death penalty in Europe for the EU as a corporate entity in time of war or imminent threat of war, by providing that the post-Lisbon EU would accede to Protocol 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which permits the use of the death penalty in such circumstances, rather than  to Protocol 13, which abolishes the death penalty at all times and which the individual Member States have separately acceded to.

This matter has caused national outrage in Austria and some controversy  in Germany, but scarcely anyone has heard about it here in Ireland.

But maybe you would dismiss that too as just another No-side “untruth”?

Yours etc.

Anthony Coughlan
Secretary

The Irish Government lines up with Brussels against the Irish people

* Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Minister Michael Martin give in to Franco-German and EU Commission pressure to permit the remaining Lisbon ratifications to continue, when they could have stopped these by saying that Ireland cannot and will not ratify the Lisbon Treaty, as the Irish people have rejected it.

* The Irish Government lines up with Brussels against the Irish people rather than stands by the people’s democratic decision of last week to defend it vis-a-vis Brussels - so as to bring about a 26/1 situation by year’s end with which to bludgeon Irish voters in a referendum re-run.

* Talk of “respecting” Ireland’s vote turns out in practice to be a cover for setting out to overturn it in a referendum re-run, with Brian Cowen’s, Michael Martin’s and Dick Roche’s full support - and behind a thick barrier of hypocrisy, spoofing and lies.

Friday 20 June 2008

* These are the three principal lies Irish Government Ministers and the EU people are telling to hide their first steps towards preparing this Lisbon referendum re-run:

* LIE NO.1: That the nine EU States that have not yet ratified Lishon have a “right” to do so irrespective of the Irish No. There is no such right under either EU law or customary international law. Brian Cowen could stop any further ratifications by saying to his EU partners that he respects the Irish No, that because of that there is no question of trying to overturn it by re-running the referendum, and that therefore Lisbon is dead because Ireland cannot ratify it and there is no point any other ratifications continuing, for Lisbon cannot come into force unless all 27 ratify it. British Foreign Secretary David Milliband underlined this point last weekend when he said that it depended on Brian Cowen whether Lisbon was alive or dead.

* LIE No. 2: Minister Dick Roche was up to this usual spoofery on “Morning Ireland” today when he attacked Patricia McKenna for saying that the French and Dutch Governments stopped further ratifications of the EU Constitution in 2005 after their peoples voted No in their referendums. Minister Roche said that Luxembourg held a referendum on this Treaty after the French and Dutch No and in his usual gentlemanly fashion accused Ms McKenna of “telling lies”. In fact, as the Minister is well aware, the Luxembourg referendum was held shortly after the French and Dutch referendums but BEFORE the French and Dutch Governments decided they would not re-run them, and therefore that they could not ratify the Constitutional Treaty - which led the remaining EU States, including Ireland, to abandon further ratifications at that time.

Messrs Cowen, Martin and Roche are spoofing like this, with their EU confreres helping them, to try to cover up the fact that the Irish Government is urging the nine remaining EU States to continue with their ratifications so as to bring about a 26/1 situation which can then be used to pressurise the Irish people to turn their No into a Yes in a second Lisbon referendum.

It is Messrs Cowen, Martin and Roche who are failing to “respect” the Irish people’s No vote by effectively telling the other EU States not to respect it either, but to continue with their ratifications. Why should the other EU States respect last Thursday’s referendum result when the Irish Government does not respect it, but sets out rather to subvert it, as they decided to do even while the voting tallies were being counted on Friday morning last?

Remember Foreign Minister Martin saying at luncthtime on the day of the count that “of course” the remaining ratifications would continue. Remember Commission President Barroso’s at his press conference held before the count was even finished, following a phone chat with Taoiseach Cowen, saying the same thing.

If Messrs Cowen, Martin and Roche had a scintilla of the political courage and statesmanship of the founder of their Party, they would be telling their EU counterparts that they had no alternative but to open up Lisbon and work out a better Treaty for Ireland, for Europe and for a more democratic EU, instead of the supranational EU Federation, with laws made on a population basis, which is what is on offer in Lisbon.

* LIE NO.3: That the other EU States can go ahead with the Lisbon Treaty provisions under the rules for “enhanced cooperation”. The barrack-room lawyers of the Irish media are speaking here. It is the enhanced cooperation rules of the EU Treaties as amended by the Nice Treaty that currently apply. It is nonsense to suggest that the enhanced cooperation provisions of one Treaty, viz. Nice, can be used to bring into force the far wider provisions of another Treaty, viz. Lisbon.

* NB: The number of EU Commissioners must be decided unanimously.
Under the current Nice Treaty(Protocol on the enlargement of the EU, Article 4), a reduction in the number of Commissioners to fewer than the number of Member States must be decided unanimously in 2009. Under the Lisbon Treaty(Article 17.5 TEU) the number of Commissioners must be reduced by two-thirds from 2014, “unless the European Council, acting unanimously, decides to alter this number.”

At their next summit meeting in October or December the European Council of Prime Ministers and Presidents will make a “European decision” that when it comes to allocating EU Commissioners in 2014 in the post-Lisbon EU, Ireland and all Member States will be permitted to retain a permanent Commissioner, although in practice there may be senior and junior Commissioners. Because both the Nice and Lisbon Treaties lay down that arrangements for the Commission require unanimity, a commitment on these lines can be given without opening Lisbon.

Taoiseach Cowen will present this as a triumph for Irish diplomacy, while his EU colleagues will smile cynically to themselves. Then various Declarations will be given - to meet Irish concerns on company taxation, human rights, neutrality etc. - which will be tagged on to the Lisbon Treaty, but wll not alter a jot or tittle of its contents.

What threats or implicit threats will be needed to go with these promises? The most obvious one is that Irish voters will be told, as they were not told over the past months - that the Lisbon Treaty aims to establish a constitutionally new Federal Union and that the Irish must decide whether they want to be members of this or not, or do they want to keep the present EU as it stands under the Nice Treaty rules.

The other Member States still cannot ratify Lisbon and establish this new Union without Ireland’s agreement. But the hope will be that this mix of promises and implicit threats will suffice to overturn the Irish people’s No in Lisbon One and turn it into a Yes in Lisbon Two.

A peaceable democratic popular revolt in Ireland and across the EU is needed to prevent this happening and to prevent the anti-democratic Lisbon Treaty-cum EU-Constitution being clamped on most of the peoples of our continent.

- Anthony Coughlan

(Secretary)

Alert: Euro-Federalists already planning to subvert Irish Referendum results

The National Platform EU Research and Information Centre
24 Crawford Avenue
Dublin 9

Tel.: 01-8305792 ;
Web-site nationalplatform.org

Media statement

Friday afternoon, 13 June 2008

Foreign Minister Michael Martin and other Irish Euro-federalists are already planning to subvert the Lisbon Treaty referendum result by urging the other EU States to continue with their ratification process instead of telling them that Ireland cannot ratify the Lisbon Treaty as it stands, and that further ratifications elsewhere are therefore pointless, and the Treaty must be reopened.

EU Treaties must be ratified unanimously. Each country ratifies a Treaty on the assumption that all other countries will do so too. If one country says that it cannot ratify a Treaty as it stands - in Ireland’s case because the Irish people have rejected it - there is no point in the other countries proceeding, and the Irish Government should request them to stop.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen now faces a momentous choice.

Will he align himself with his own people and respect the Irish people’s vote by telling his EU colleagues that Ireland cannot ratify Lisbon as it stands, and therefore there is no point in the remaining States continuing with their ratifications?

Or will be align himself with the other EU States against the Irish people, and urge the former to proceed with their ratifications on the assumption that Ireland will re-run the referendum when everyone else has ratified, as Bertie Ahern did with Nice. For that is the implication of other EU States now proceeding with ratifying the Treaty with the Irish Government’s encouragement.

Mr Bobby McDonagh and the top civil servants in Iveagh House will already be planning a joint response with France and Germany to insist on the ratification process continuing. Foreign Minister Martin’s comments on lunchtime radio today about other countries “of course” continuing with their ratifications, reflects the policy the Iveagh House people will be urging.

The Irish No vote is on a much more substantial turnout than the 35% of Nice One in 2001. The No majority is much stronger. It reflects much wider concern at the way the EU project is going. Representative members of the Irish political class have broken with the predominant uncritical consensus on the Euro-Federalist project - Shane Ross, Declan Ganley, Bruce Arnold, Ben Dunne, Gay Byrne, Ulick McEvaddy, Prof. Ray Kinsella, Gerard Hogan,

This provides Ireland and Europe with an opportunity to take a fundamental look at the EU integration process.

Neither the Irish people nor the peoples of the other EU countries want an EU that is given the constitutional form of a State, as the Lisbon Treaty and the EU Constitiution proposed, even though this issue was not highlighted in the referendum. The peoples of Europe will not tolerate such a fundamental subversion of their national democracy and independence. Even if this federalised EU were to be brought off, it would not be sustainable.

Instead of the “period of reflection” which was supposed to follow the French and Dutch No votes in 2005, and which turned out to be an excuse for repackaging the rejected Constitution in the form of the Lisbon Treaty, Europe now needs a period of consultation - with its own peoples, with citizens everywhere - and not just a matter of Brussels talking to Brussels.

The best course now is to return to the aspirations of the Laeken Declaration, which called for democracy, transparency and closeness to the people. The EU Member States should now go back to the drawing-board, for their own sakes, for Ireland’s sake and for Europe’s.

Fundamental to any new Treaty is Lisbon’s population-based voting system which is not acceoptable to Ireland or to other smaller States, for it represents a power-grab by the Big States. Each State must retain its national Commissioner, a demand that does not require the opening of the Treaty.

Each State must retain the right to decide who its national Commissioner is, instead of that right being altered to a right to make “suggestions” only. Any future new Treaty should contain special Protocols to safeguard Ireland’s position as regards company taxation, public services, fundamental rights or mutual defence commitments. Laws in Brussels should only be made by people who are directly elected to make them, eitherin the European Parliament or National Parliaments. These are fundamental principles of democracy.

Anthony Coughlan
Secretary

A funny Lisbon Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgRLs4_1KI0

Lisbon Treaty: Where is this all going?

1. Harmonisation of Corporate Tax;

2. Losing permanent Commissioner, Halving voting strength;

3. The “Blank Cheque” Self-Amending power;

4. Superiority of all EU law over Irish Constitution;

5. Lisbon origin in rejected EU Constitution.

* Where is this all going? Harmonisation of Corporate tax:

Article 2.79 of the Lisbon Treaty would insert a six-word amendment -”and to avoid distorton of competition” - into the Article of the existing European Treaties dealing with harmonising indirect taxes - Article 113.

This would enable the European Court of Justice, which adjudicates on competition matters, to decide that Ireland’s 12.5% rate of company tax, as against Germany’s 30%, is a distortion of competition which breaches the Treaty Articles dealing with the internal market (Art. 26 and Arts.101-9 TFEU) in relation to which qualified majority voting on the Council of Ministers applies.

The Irish Government’s veto under Article 113 would thus be irrelevant.

* Where is this all going? Loss of permanent Commissioner and reduction in voting strength:

- Lisbon removes any Irish voice from the EU Commission, the body which has the monopoly of proposing all EU laws, for five years out of every 15 (Art.17.5 TEU).

- Lisbon abolishes our right to decide who the Irish Commissioner is when it comes to our turn to be on the Commission, replacing it by a right to make “suggestions” only for the Commission President to decide (Art.17.7 TEU).

- Lisbon Treaty would double Germany’s say on the EU Council of Ministers; Ireland’s voting weight would be more than halved to 1% (Art.16 TEU).

* Where is this all going? The self-amending Treaty:

- This could be Ireland’s last referendum on Europe - the EU can acquire new competences without another treaty, like signing a blank cheque.

- Lisbon would permit the EU Prime Ministers to shift most of the remaining EU policy areas where unanimity still exists, to majority voting, without need for new EU Treaties or referendums (Art.48 TEU).

* Where is this all going? The dilution of Bunreacht na hEireann and the superiority of EU law:

EU law is already superior to Irish law. Lisbon would further weaken Irish control by adding more competences and powers to the EU.

- It hands over to the EU the power to make laws binding on us in 32 new policy areas, such as crime, justice and policing, public services, immigration, energy, transport, tourism, sport, culture, public health, the EU budget etc.

- It removes a national veto in 68 areas

- Lisbon will give the EU Court of Justice the power to decide our rights as EU citizens - Ireland’s Supreme Court would no longer have the final say (Art.6 TEU).

* Where is this all going? The Treaty’s origin in the EU Constitution:

- The Lisbon treaty is a repackaged version of the EU Constitution (96% the same). France and the Netherlands both rejected it, people across Europe have felt increasing unease about the EU project.

Events across 16 European countries dedicated to the referendum in Ireland

COPENHAGEN 30/5/2008
Press Release:

Events across 16 European countries dedicated to the referendum in Ireland

12 Danish organizations congratulates the Irish people in front of the Irish embassy, Østbanegade, 21 in Copenhagen today from 3 PM to 4 PM

Ireland is the only member state to grant its citizens a vote on the so-called Lisbon Treaty (the Reform Treaty). The referendum is to be held on 12th June and is a stimulus for organisations all across Europe to point out the democratic shortcomings of the ratification process of the treaty in every other member state.

Under the slogan “Congratulations Ireland”, 12 Danish organisations congratulate the Irish people on their say in front of the Irish embassy in Copenhagen. The 12 Danish organizations represent many different views on the EU – for instance there are supporters of EU as well as organizations against EU and there are organizations from all sides of the political spectrum.

“We congratulate you on having a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, as that proves that your democracy is stronger than ours” says the spokesman of Social Democratic Network Europe Nicolas E. Fischer.

The 12 organizations will through the Irish ambassador Joe Hayes hand over a letter to the Irish people. In the letter the organizations congratulate Ireland and states:

“The entire process of carrying through the EU Constitution and the Lisbon Treaty has been characterized by heavy manipulation. You too are experiencing measures taken by the EU system aiming at limiting the objectivity of the debate in Ireland. One instance is the instructions within the EU system to avoid sensitive questions that will be influenced by the Lisbon Treaty.

You also experience threats as to what will happen if your referendum should result in a no to the Lisbon Treaty. But those are empty threats. You are entitled to decide for yourselves, and the rest of the EU must respect your choice and make common cause with you, regardless of the outcome.”

The English version of the letter is attached.

For more information please contact:

Nicolas E. Fischer, Social Democratic Network Europe: +45 23 22 44 82, fischer(at)zetnet(dot)dk

Lave K. Broch, EU-critical Network of Social liberals: +45 28 92 21 27, lave(at)radikaleukritik(dot)dk

Peter Westermann, Challenge Europe: +45 21 94 16 09, peterwestermann(at)gmail(dot)com

Kenneth Haar, ATTAC: +45 23 60 06 31, kenneth(at)attac(dot)dk

Open letter to the Irish People from Denmark

Congratulations, Ireland!
- You are the only people in EU who will have a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty!

Copenhagen the 30th of May 2008

Dear Irish people,
We congratulate you on having a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, as that proves that your democracy is stronger than ours.
In our country, Denmark, a large majority wanted a referendum, but a majority in our parliament was afraid of the voice of the people. Consequently they ratified the Lisbon Treaty without a referendum and without a real debate.
The entire process of carrying through the EU Constitution and the Lisbon Treaty has been characterized by heavy manipulation. You too are experiencing measures taken by the EU system aiming at limiting the objectivity of the debate in Ireland. One instance is the instructions within the EU system to avoid sensitive questions that will be influenced by the Lisbon Treaty.
You also experience threats as to what will happen if your referendum should result in a no to the Lisbon Treaty. But those are empty threats. You are entitled to decide for yourselves, and the rest of the EU must respect your choice and make common cause with you, regardless of the outcome.
Consequently we also feel confident that you are able to see through the essence of the Lisbon Treaty - and we congratulate you on your referendum. You will be voting for all the citizens in EU countries, who would have wanted a referendum on the re-named EU Constitution.
In this matter Ireland is the democratic light of Europe. Long live the Irish democracy!
Attac Denmark - www.attac.dk
Citizens’ Initiative Yes to Europe - No to the EU Constitution – www.euforfatningnej.dk
Trade Unions against the European Union – www.eufagligt.dk
People’s Movement against the EU - www.folkebevaegelsen.dk
June Movement - www.j.dk
Europe of Nations - Supporters of the European Community against more Union – Frank Dahlgaard phone number 0045-44 44 62 29
Necessary Forum – www.nodvendigtforum.dk
EU-critical Network of Social liberals – www.radikaleukritik.dk
Social democratic Network Europe – Nicolas E. Fisher phone number: 0045- 23 22 44 82
The think-tank New Agenda – www.nyagenda.dk
Challenge Europe – www.udfordringeuropa.dk
Youth against EU – www.nejnu.dk

Irish Times: “Lisbon would turn Ireland into a province”

Irish Times  article, Friday 16 May

 

VOTE NO TO LISBON AND REJECT EUROPEAN FEDERAL STATE

Lisbon would  turn Ireland into a province or region of an EU superstate and make us citizens of it first rather than of the Irish Republic

 

by Anthony Coughlan

 
The push to turn the European Union into a superpower with many of the features of a Federal State goes back to World War 2, when the continental imperial powers, France, Germany, Italy, Holland and Belgium, experienced the trauma of defeat and occupation.  After 1945 they found themselves much diminished in a world dominated by the USA and USSR.

One response of their political elites was to decide that if they could no longer be Big Powers individually on their own, they would seek to be a Big Power collectively. This is not the full story of European integration, but it is perhaps the most important part of the story. 

The Lisbon Treaty is the constitutional culmination of the federalist project which has been the political dynamic of European integration ever since the Schumann Declaration of 1950 proclaimed the European Coal and Steel Community to be “the first step in the federation of Europe”.

The EU commemorates that Declaration on  9 May each year - Europe Day.  Fifty years later, in 2004, Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt proclaimed the EU Constitution to be “the capstone of a European Federal State”.

When the French and Dutch rejected the EU Constitution in their 2005 referendums, the Prime Ministers and Presidents decided to give the EU the constitutional form of a Federation indirectly rather than directly.

This the Lisbon Treaty does by amending the two existing European Treaties instead of replacing them entirely  by a formally titled Constitution. But the legal-political effect is the same.

THE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT WE WILL VOTE ON 

The first sentence of the Amendment which the Government is asking  to insert into the Irish  Constitution provides that the State may ratify the Treaty of Lisbon and ”may be a member of the European Union established by virtue of that  [Lisbon] Treaty.“  

This sentence shows that the European Union which would be established by the Lisbon Treaty, although having the same name, is constitutionally and politically a different Union from that which we are currently members of, which was established by the 1993 Maastricht Treaty.

The second sentence of the Constitutional Amendment would then give the constitution of this post-Lisbon Union supremacy over the Irish Constitution:-

“No provision of this  [Irish] Constitution invalidates laws enacted, acts done or measures adopted by the State that are necessitated by membership of the European Union referred to Š or prevents laws enacted, acts done or measures adopted by the said European Union or by institutions thereof, or by bodies competent under the treaties referred to in this section, from having the force of law in the State.”

This post-Lisbon EU would have the constitutional form of a supranational European Federation - in effect a State - in which Ireland and the other Member States would have the constitutional status of provincial or regional states.

From the inside the Union would look like something based on Treaties between States. From the outside it would look  like a State itself.  This constitutional revolution in both the Union ands its Member States would be brought about by four legal steps which are set out in the Treaty, as they were in the previous EU Constitution:

Firstly, Lisbon would give the post-Lisbon Union full legal personality separate from and superior to its Member States, so that it could act as a State in the international community of States, sign Treaties with other States in all areas of its powers, have its own political President, Foreign Minister(High Representative), diplomatic service, embassies and Public Prosecutor, and make most of our laws.

Secondly, Lisbon would abolish the European Community which we joined in 1973 and which still exists as part of the present EU, and replace it by the new Union (Art.1 TEU). 

Thirdly, it would give the new Union a unified constitutional stucture so that all areas of government would come within its aegis either actually or potentially(Art.4 TEU, Arts.1-6 TFEU).  The only major feature of a fully developed Federation which the EU would then lack would be the power to force its Member States to go to war against their will.

SUBORDINATING THE IRISH CONSTITUTION TO THE EU CONSTITUTION   

Finally, Lisbon would make us all real citizens for the first time of this post-Lisbon Union, rather than our being notional or honorary EU “citizens” as at present(Art.9 TEU).

One can only be a citizen of a State and all States must have citizens. As real EU citizens we would owe it the duty of obedience to its laws and loyalty to its authority over and above our obedience and loyalty to Ireland and the Irish Constitution and laws.

We would still retain our national Irish citizenship, but our new dual citizenship post-Lisbon would not be citizenship of two different States, but rather of the federal and regional/provincial levels of one state, as is normal in such classical Federations as the USA, Federal Germany, Switzerland and Canada. 

The Irish Constitution would remain - just as the various states of the Federal USA still retain their constitutions -  but it would be subordinate to the EU Constitution in any case of conflict between the two. 

One indicator of the constitutional change which Lisbon would bring about is that Members of the European Parliament, who under the present Treaties are “representatives of the peoples  of the Member States brought together in the Community”, would become “representatives ofthe Union’s citizens“ in the post-Lisbon EU(Art.14.2 TEU).  

Another is that the European Council, the summit meetings of Prime Ministers and Presidents, would become an EU institution for the first time, legally bound to forward the interests of the Union, not of the national Governments or electorates concerned, so that its acts or its failing to act would be subject to judicial review by the EU Court of Justice(Art.13 TEU).

Couple these constitutional changes with the power-political changes which Lisbon would bring about and it is clear that the Lisbon referendum confronts the Irish people with a momentous choice.

The most important power-political change is that Lisbon would base law-making in the post-Lisbon Union primarily on population size.

 This would double Germany’s relative voting strength on the Council of Ministers from its present 8% to 17%. It would increase the voting weight of France, Britain and Italy from their present 8% to 12% each and it would halve Ireland’s weight from 2% to 0.8%.(Art.16.4 TEU)

As well as our being deprived of a voice on the EU Commission, the body which proposes all EU laws, for five years out of every 15, a little noticed feature of Lisbon’s provisions is that when it comes to our turn to have an Irish Commissioner, we would  lose the right to decide who he or she would be. Henceforth Ireland would be able to make “suggestions” only, for the new Commission President to decide(Art.17.7 TEU). 

It is surely a major historical moment by any standard: this attempt to turn four million Irish people and nearly 500 million Europeans into real citizens of a real EU Federation, without most of them being aware of it, and without any but us Irish being allowed to have a direct say on it.  

If Lisbon is ratified it is bound to lead to major democratic reactions across Europe when people discover that their national independence and democracy have been filched from them. That is why the best course for the Irish people is to vote No to Lisbon on 12 June, as the French and Dutch did to its virtually identical predecessor, for their own sakes and for Europe’s.

_______

Anthony Coughlan is secretary of the National Platform EU  Research and Information Centre, 24 Crawford Avenue, Dublin  9;  Tel.: 00-353-1-8305792;   Web-site: nationalplatform.org

Barroso, Bonde and Ireland’s company Taxes

Monday 28 April 2008

Barroso, Bonde and  Ireland’s company Taxes . . . Excerpt from “Bonde’s Briefing” by Jens-Peter Bonde MEP, Chairman, Independence and Democracy Group in the European Parliament, forwarded for your information

Misinformation in Ireland

I was in Ireland this weekend (18 April). Accidentally I met the Commission President José Manuel Barroso at the University of Cork. I had two other meetings. He made a splendid speech, particularly when he went outside his manuscript.

It became clear to me that his civil servants had agreed a part of his speech with the Irish Government representatives to mislead Irish citizens about a hot issue in the Irish debate: their low corporate tax at only 12.5 %.

Mislead is a strong - but very precise - expression. Barroso said there was nothing new in the Lisabon Treaty about taxes.

This is positively wrong. The new Art.113 TFEU(Treaty on the Functioning of the EU)  about taxes adds a new phrase of “and to avoid distortion of competition” as an amendment to the Article.  This is a clear invitation to the European Court of Justice to outlaw the very distorting low Irish rate.

Today the EU is only competent to harmonise tax laws under Article 113 if it is “necessary to ensure the establishment of the internal market”.  With this Lisbon Treaty amendment the EU can also harmonise  tax laws if competition is distorted - this is a much wider concept. When is competition not distorted by differences?

In a new special Protocol to the Lisbon Treaty, “Protocol on the Internal Market and Competition” (No. 4),  it is also added that the Internal Market “includes a system ensuring that competition is not distorted”. National hindrances can be outlawed, even by legislation based on the so-called “Flexibility clause” referred to in this Protocol.

In Art.116 TFEU distortions of competition can be hindered by laws decided by qualified majority voting in the Council. First, the Commission consults the distorting Member State.  Article 116 then provides: “If such consultation does not result in an agreement eliminating the distortion in question, the European Parliament and the Council, acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure, shall issue the necessary directives. Any  other appropriate measures provided for in the Treaties may be adopted.”

In the Reader-Friendly Edition of the Consolidated Treaties which I have edited (see euabc.com )  the text in bold is the new addition to Article 113 on  corporation taxes made by the Lisbon Treaty: “and to avoid distortion of competition”. Hindrances  may be eliminated by majority voting.

So, if I was Irish and interested in the low corporate tax - which I am not - I would propose a strong Protocol to protect the low rate. It is not difficult to foresee an attack from another country - or company. The French Presidency has already signalled its plans for taxation before they enter into office 1 July.

The Irish Government has criticized the French intentions. Well, the  tax issue is also included in the annual work program for Barroso’s European Commission for 2008!

“Work will also be continued in order to allow companies to choose an EU-wide tax base as set out in the 2008 Annual Policy Strategy. An impact assessment has been launched to examine the options and their implications”, it is said at page 7 of the Work Programme.

The Commission will only publish their proposal - after the Irish referendum. All controversial proposals are delayed before referendums. This is normal practice for the Commission. It is only un-normal that the method has been leaked to the press with the publication of a private e-mail from a British diplomat referring  to information received from the Irish Government in confidence.

The Commission is working on a proposal to harmonise - maybe not the rate, but the base for calculating corporate taxes. The economic effect for Ireland may be the same.

Ireland has earned a lot on multinational companies settling in Ireland but selling products to the whole of the EU. Now, the Commission proposal - according to rumours - will distribute profit for taxation according to the spread of the turnover.

It does not sound surprising - or unjust - to me. This is the way the Commission is thinking - in spite of the Barroso speech to calm the Irish voters before their referendum scheduled for 12 June.

A joint rate will require unanimity, yes. But to outlaw the low rate in a Court verdict only requires a simple majority in the EU Court of Justice in Luxembourg. It is mis-leading not to tell the Irish the full truth about the Lisbon Treaty and taxation.

Even new direct taxes for the Union could be introduced by the Lisbon Treaty.  See Art. 311 TFEU on the establishment of new Union “own resources” by unanimity among Member States.

“…it may establish new categories of own resources”, it is said in the new Art. 311 inserted by Lisbon.

It is also said stated: “The Union shall provide itself with the means necessary to attain its objectives and carry through its policies”.
< http://www.bonde.com/index.php/bonde_UK/article/bondes_briefing_23042008 >

A Note on Jens-Peter Bonde MEP

The author of the above statement, Jens-Peter Bonde, Danish MEP, has just edited  a “Reader-Friendly Edition of the Consolidated Treaties as Amended by the Treaty  of Lisbon“. This shows the additions to the two main EU Treaties that would  be made by Lisbon in bold type,  and the deletions in strikethrough.

This volume contains an invaluable index which will enable anyone interested in a particular topic to find easily the Consolidated Treaty Articles relating to it and to see how these would be affected by any deletions or additions made by the Lisbon Treaty.

This Reader-Friendly Edition of the Lisbon Treaty is now  downloadable free from  bonde.com.

Bonde has also written a short 100-page book describing the background to the Treaty  and giving a general analysis of it: “From EU Constitution to Lisbon Treaty”. This will be downloadable later this week from  the web-sites:  bonde.com and euinfo.ie

Jens-Peter Bonde was a member of the Convention on the Future of Europe which drew up the original  EU Constitution that  would now be brought into being indirectly rather than directly  by means of  the Lisbon Treaty.  He has been an MEP since the first direct elections to the European Parliament  in 1979 and  he is retiring  from the Parliament on 9 May, Europe Day, having recently reached his 60th birthday. He first came to Ireland in 1986 to express support for  the late Raymond Crotty in his constitutional action on the Single European Act, which led to the current referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. He is chairman of the Independence and Democracy Group in the European Parliament to which Munster MEP Kathy Sinnott  belongs.  He has written some 40 books on EU-related topics over the years and  is widely known and respected for his tireless work over decades for a more transparent, less centralised and  more democratic European Union.  Together with Ireland’s John Gormley and others he produced a minority report on an Alternative to the EU Constitution at the close of Giscard d’Estaing’s Convention on the Future of Europe in 2004.

For enquiries contact Anthony Coughlan at 01-8305792.

Jens-Peter Bonde himself may be contacted  at the European Parliament at 00-32-2-2845167 and at Jens-Peter.bonde@europarl.europa.eu

Irish Referendum, Lisbon Treaty Quotes

WHAT TOP EU POLITICIANS SAY ABOUT THE LISBON TREATY/ EU CONSTITUTION
(These quotations are in chronological order backwards)

“France was just ahead of all the other countries in voting No. It would happen in all Member States if they have a referendum. There is a cleavage between people and governments… A referendum now would bring Europe into danger. There will be no Treaty if we had a referendum in France, which would again be followed by a referendum in the UK.”
- French President Nicolas Sarkozy,at meeting of senior MEPs, EUobserver, 14 November 2007
_______

“The difference between the original Constitution and the present Lisbon Treaty is one of approach, rather than content … The proposals in the original constitutional treaty are practically unchanged. They have simply been dispersed through the old treaties in the form of amendments. Why this subtle change? Above all, to head off any threat of referenda by avoiding any form of constitutional vocabulary … But lift the lid and look in the toolbox: all the same innovative and effective tools are there, just as they were carefully crafted by the European Convention.”
- V.Giscard D’Estaing, former French President and Chairman of the Convention which drew up the EU Constitution, The Independent, London, 30 October 2007
______

‘ “I think it’s a bit upsetting… to see so many countries running away from giving their people an opportunity”, Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern said on Sunday 21 October, according to the Irish Independent. ‘If you believe in something …why not let your people have a say in it. I think the Irish people should take the opportunity to show the rest of Europe that they believe in the cause, and perhaps others shouldn’t be so afraid of it,’ he added. “
- Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, EU Observer, Brussels, 22 October 2007
______

“They decided that the document should be unreadable. If it is unreadable, it is not constitutional, that was the sort of perception. Where they got this perception from is a mystery to me. In order to make our citizens happy, to produce a document that they will never understand! But, there is some truth [in it]. Because if this is the kind of document that the IGC will produce, any Prime Minister - imagine the UK Prime Minister - can go to the Commons and say ‘Look, you see, it’s absolutely unreadable, it’s the typical Brussels treaty, nothing new, no need for a referendum.’ Should you succeed in understanding it at first sight there might be some reason for a referendum, because it would mean that there is something new.”
- Giuliano Amato, former Italian Prime Minister and Vice-Chairman of the Convention which drew up the EU Constitution, recorded by Open Europe, The Centre for European Reform, London, 12 July 2007
_____

“Sometimes I like to compare the EU as a creation to the organisation of empires. We have the dimension of Empire but there is a great difference. Empires were usually made with force with a centre imposing diktat, a will on the others. Now what we have is the first non-imperial empire.”
- Commission President J-M Barroso, The Brussels Journal, 11 July 2007
_____

“Public opinion will be led to adopt, without knowing it, the proposals that we dare not present to them directly … All the earlier proposals will be in the new text, but will be hidden and disguised in some way.”
- V.Giscard D’Estaing, Le Monde, 14 June 2007, and Sunday Telegraph, 1 July 2007
____

” The most striklng change ( between the EU Constitution in its older and newer version ) is perhaps that in order to enable some governments to reassure their electorates that the changes will have no constitutional implications, the idea of a new and simpler treaty containing all the provisions governing the Union has now been dropped in favour of a huge series of individual amendments to two existing treaties. Virtual incomprehensibilty has thus replaced simplicity as the key approach to EU reform. As for the changes now proposed to be made to the constitutional treaty, most are presentational changes that have no practical effect. They have simply been designed to enable certain heads of government to sell to their people the idea of ratification by parliamentary action rather than by referendum.”
- Dr Garret FitzGerald, former Irish Taoiseach, Irish Times, 30 June 2007
_____
“The substance of the constitution is preserved.That is a fact.”
- German Chancellor Angela Merkel, speech in the European Parliament, 27 June 2007
_______

The good thing is that all the symbolic elements are gone, and that which really matters - the core - is left.”
- Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Danish Prime Minister, Jyllands-Posten, 25 June 2007
_______

“The substance of what was agreed in 2004 has been retained. What is gone is the term ‘constitution’ “.
- Dermot Ahern, Irish Foreign Minister, Daily Mail Ireland, 25 June 2007
______
“90 per cent of it is still there…These changes haven’t made any dramatic change to the substance of what was agreed back in 2004.”
- Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, Irish Independent, 24 June 2007
____

“The aim of the Constitutional Treaty was to be more readable; the aim of this treaty is to be unreadable … The Constitution aimed to be clear, whereas this treaty had to be unclear. It is a success.”
- Karel de Gucht, Belgian Foreign Minister, Flandreinfo, 23 June 2007
____

“The good thing about not calling it a Constltution is that no one can ask for a referendum on it.”
- Giuliano Amato, speech at London School of Econmics, 21 February 2007

____

“Referendums make the process of approval of European treaties much more complicated and less predictable … I was in favour of a referendum as a prime minister, but it does make our lives with 27 member states in the EU much more difficult. If a referendum had to be held on the creation of the European Community or the introduction of the euro, do you think these would have passed?”
- Commission President Jose M. Barroso, Irish Times, 8 Feb.2007; quoting remarks in Het Financieele Dag and De Volkskrant, Holland; also quoted in EUobserver, 6 February 2007
_____

” It is true that we are experiencing an ever greater, inappropriate centralisation of powers away from the Member States and towards the EU. The German Ministry of Justice has compared the legal acts adopted by the Federal Republic of Germany between 1998 and 2004 with those adopted by the European Union in the same period. Results: 84 percent come from Brussels, with only 16 percent coming originally from Berlin … Against the fundamental principle of the separation of powers, the essential European legislative functions lie with the members of the executive … The figures stated by the German Ministry of Justice make it quite clear. By far the large majority of legislation valid in Germany is adopted by the German Government in the Council of Ministers, and not by the German Parliament … And so the question arises whether Germany can still be referred to unconditionally as a parliamentary democracy at all, because the separation of powers as a fundamental constituting principle of the constitutional order in Germany has been cancelled out for large sections of the legislation applying to this country … The proposed draft Constitution does not contain the possibility of restoring individual competencies to the national level as a centralisation brake. Instead, it counts on the same one-way street as before, heading towards ever greater centralisation … Most people have a fundamentally positive attitude to European integration. But at the same time, they have an ever increasing feeling that something is going wrong, that an untransparent, complex, intricate, mammoth institution has evolved, divorced from the factual problems and national traditions, grabbing ever greater competencies and areas of power; that the democratic control mechanisms are failing: in brief, that it cannot go on like this.”
- Former German President Roman Herzog and former president of the German Constitutional Court, article on the EU Constitution, Welt Am Sonntag, 14 January 2007

_______

“If it’s a Yes, we will say ‘On we go”, and if it’s a No we will say ‘We continue.’”
- Jean-Claude Juncker, Luxembourg Prime Minister and holder of the EU Presidency, Daily Telegraph, 26 May 2005

________
“The Constitution is the capstone of a European Federal State.”
- Guy Verhofstadt, Belgian Prime Minister, Financial Times, 21 June 2004
_____
“Are we all clear that we want to build something that can aspire to be a world power? In other words, not just a trading bloc but a political entity. Do we realise that our nation states, taken individually, would find it far more difficult to assert their existence and their identity on the world stage.”
- Commission President Romano Prodi, European Parliament, 13 February 2001