Irish Election are pleased to announce our collection of Irish 
Say Yes!
Read more about: Lisbon Treaty
You know, I think that the Lisbon Treaty campaign has to have been one of the most tedious referendum campaigns we’ve ever had in this country. The momentum has always been with the no side who have released and re-released certain arguments in different forms over the past few weeks. These arguments usually have an extreme and a respectable form and center around neutrality, taxation, the charter of human rights and the changes to the commission, council and presidency.
The hard form of the neutrality argument usually emerges from the mouths of common village idiots and usually takes the form of some claim about the treaty leading to the creation of a European army. The soft form of the argument, most commonly used by the more respectable village idiots, forwards the idea that the treaty obliges us to increase military spending and that we might be sucked into some sort of alliance against our will.
In regards neutrality and military structures, the ‘no’ arguments have been refuted time and time again by the ‘yes’ campaign. The relevant parts of the treaty contain a unanimity clause and the treaty also recognises that any action is subject to the constitutional requirements of member states. What this means is that the Irish triple lock system now applies to any potential EU military action. The EU needs Ireland’s consent if it is to act. Granted member states can take action without our consent, but not as the EU and this does not constitute a change from the status quo. As for military spending, Ireland is only obliged to improve its military capability and let’s face it, are military capabilities are less than impressive as it stands. Our airspace is particularly vulnerable as the air-corps is incapable of defending it on its own.
As for taxation, the extreme argument put forward by the ‘no’ side has been that the EU Court of Justice now has the power to rule whether or not Irish corporation tax rates distort competition within the EU and that if Lisbon is passed we could be forced to cut our rates. The soft form acknowledges the fact that direct taxation is not the concern of the EU, but they tend to make vague arguments about destination taxes and the like. Now these arguments are usually so vaguely made as to make them impossible to properly refute but the fact is the only impact the treaty could possibly have would be in regards indirect taxation and even then unanimity applies once more.
Groups like Coir focused much energy scaremongering about the Charter of Fundamental Rights into European Union law. They focused on abortion but there was also talk of the legalisation of prostitution and euthanasia as well. Libertas and other supposedly respectable ‘no’ campaigners made vague arguments about there being question marks over issues like these. The fact is that Maastricht Protocol which protects the Irish constitutional situation regarding the status of the unborn remains in place. It’s also been made clear that the introduction of the charter changes little in that it the article dealing with it makes it explicitly states it does not affect the EU’s competencies.
If any of the ‘no’ arguments hold weight, it would be in regards the changes to how the EU is governed. The extremists talk as though the occasional loss of a commissioner, the creation of an elected president of the European Council and the new double majority voting system for the council amounted to the complete removal of the Irish voice from the decision making process. The respectables make similar arguments but without the same level of bluster.
Both talk as though Ireland was the only country affected. All other states will have to play by the same rules. Compared to the status quo, the new rules for the European Council can only be described as fair. Those who tend to be swayed by talk of the presidency tend to be those who fail to appreciate the fact that there is already a rotating presidency. The new position will not be a US style president, but a far less powerful position. The President of the council will be elected by the members of the council, in the same way that the Taoiseach is chosen by the members of the Dail. Historically, the possession of a commissioner was of greater value to a smaller state than to a larger one, but the new commission will function rather differently. In effect, it forces member states to work together. While in the past, in spite of what they might have publicly claimed, commissioners did not serve the EU but the state that nominated them, now if a commissioner hopes to serve those who nominated him, he must remember that that nation will not have a commissioner at some point in the near future. If that nation’s interests are to be protected, she/he must build up good will amongst the other member states so that in his/her absence, the other member states will remember to give due consideration to his/her nation’s interests.
Before moving on to discuss the benefits of the treaty and the possible implications of the treaty, it might be a good idea to examine the arguments of some of those who have accepted that while we can veto any proposals made about military operations, tax harmonisation or the like, the government might not exercise their veto. The extremists tend to believe that the government would not exercise the veto because they’re part of some evil conspiracy to set up a new world order. The respectable side imagine that they might be out-witted. What both the respectables and the extremists neglect is that this has nothing to do with the treaty we’re voting on. If you don’t think the government can do their job properly, then vote for someone else. Whether or not Lisbon is passed is of no import if you imagine the government to be so incompetent or evil as they would not exercise our veto when it would be in the national interest to do so.
Now, if you’ve made it this far through this post, then well done. Most people would have lost interest a long time ago. And that’s the problem that the ‘yes’ campaign has faced from the beginning. By the time, they’ve refuted the ‘no’ arguments, they’re left with only a little time to sell the agreement, and to be honest, there’s very little to sell. The treaty offers the EU a potentially more efficient decision making process and the European parliament gets some extra powers. Sure, there’s some positive talk about climate change and human rights, but that’s mostly just talk. In comparison to the ‘no’ side’s exciting fantasies, these arguments seem quite boring. It’s the difference between trying to sell a lottery ticket and a savings account.
Perhaps this is why some ‘yes’ campaigners have talked as though rejection of the treaty would lead to dire consequences for Ireland. While it wouldn’t be good for Ireland’s image, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. If the treaty was rejected and the Lisbon treaty abandoned, the real damage would be done to the EU as an entity. This would be the second time that the member states had failed to reach a consensus on the EU’s future. It would, as the Financial Times suggests, hurt the EU’s credibility which would negatively impact on the block and its members efforts to make international agreements from which we might have benefited.
Accepting the treaty strengthens Europe. There’s a very good reason that all of the major political parties endorse the treaty. There’s a very good reason that IBEC, SIPTU, the IFA and many smaller unions have endorsed the treaty. The government, the opposition and big business have all taken expert advice and come to the conclusion that to accept the treaty is better than to reject it. If you’re in doubt about which way to vote, then it is a good idea to question yourself about why all of these groups have endorsed ‘yes’ vote. Surely, if it was against the interests of farmers, multinationals, unions or the public in general, some organisation other than lunatic fringe groups would have objected? The only alternative explanation for why all of the mainstream organisations of Irish society support Lisbon involves accepting the kind of rubbish sometimes found escaping Jim Corr’s mouth.
I’m voting yes. Unless you believe in conspiracy theories, you should too.
What this means is that the Irish triple lock system now applies to any potential EU military action. The EU needs Ireland’s consent if it is to act. Granted member states can take action without our consent, but not as the EU and this does not constitute a change from the status quo.
So you’re saying that Irish demands that it maintains its “neutrality” will effectively hold up the entire European Rapid Reaction force from acting? What’s to rapid about that?
I’m no European scholar but my understanding of the situation would be that the EU can officially act in a conflict that is not authorised by the UN and/or Dáil but Ireland would not be obliged to take part in the action. That would seem the most logical to me, otherwise the “Rapid Reaction Force” and EU would only be able to move as fast as its slowest (or most anti-war) member.
I cannot agree with you on the EU’s only powers being over indirect taxation stemming from Lisbon. What Article 93/113 states is that the Council shall take measures of harmonisation of indirect taxes, turnover taxes and excise duties. To my mind, the proposed destination-taxes planned by EU Tax Commissioner Laslo Kovacs constitute a form of turnover tax as they are a form of sales tax on companies exporting from Ireland and other EU states. The plan - which Kovacs claims is supported by 2/3rds of member states - would force companies to pay their taxes proportionately in the countries where the sale takes place. Because Ireland exports 90% of what it produces, this can only lose the Irish Exchequer billions in tax revenues, and even more so longterm as multinationals stop coming to Ireland because the incentive effect of not having to pay punitive Franco-German tax rates would be gone if they still had to pay them while setting up here anyway. Commissioner Kovacs has also said he will use Enhanced Cooperation, requiring the approval of the Commission (on which Ireland will no longer always have a member under Lisbon) to push through the destination tax/CCCTB (Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base) plan over Irish objections. After the govt lies about immigration under Nice, why should we believe them now? I sure don’t.
As for your point on why the elites are united in favour of a yes vote, I conclude it’s for a similar motivation as that which passed the Act of Union 1800. They are mostly out for themselves (with a few honorable exceptions) and looking for jobs in the myriad of EU agencies. My blog recently covered the issue of the Irish membership of the European Economic and Social Committee which advises the European Parliament. Its membership reads like a list of former IFA/ICMSA/SIPTU/IBEC/Chambers Ireland leaders who called for yes votes in the past. John Bruton is EU ambassador to the US, while a leaked European Parliament plan on the implementation of the EU treaty proposes to set up 160 EU embassies around the world under the plans for the External Action Agency/Diplomatic corps to be set up by Lisbon. So lots of jobs for the boys and girls if they close their eyes and think of Europe.
We have to set aside the self-serving motives of many of the leading campaigners on the ‘yes’ side some of whom will unashamedly seek to use their experience of this referendum campaign to carve out an entitlement to jobs and positions on the European gravy train, like appointments to EU institutions or selection as candidates for the next elections to the European Parliament and so on. It’s a side issue with a large dollop of hypocrisy on top since many on the ‘no’ side are similarly motivated to make a name for themselves in national politics or as Euroskeptics of the future. It has always and ever been that way in any field of politics, and it’s a distraction from the real issues.
Last week I rang up one of the main political parties and asked if I could go out canvassing with them for a ‘yes’ vote even though I wasn’t a member of that party and definitely not a supporter of their policies in most areas of national politics. And no, I haven’t read the Lisbon Treaty in its entirety; just the bits that I felt had implications for Ireland or were of concern for me. (When I was buying my house many years ago i didn’t read the solicitor’s file on that either - most of the documentation would in any case have been impenetrable to me - instead I relied on my legal advisors to interpret the contract material since that is what I was paying them to do on my behalf.) I had read the earlier draft Constitution and I was also familiar with the Nice Treaty on which I did some work with the Institute of European Affairs at the time of Nice 2.
Having heard and evaluated all the arguments for and against Lisbon, my reasons for voting yes, and at the latter stages of the campaign for deciding to go out canvassing others to also vote yes, might be summarised as follows:
• Lisbon is far from perfect, it’s good in spots, foul in others; but it took six years (with the failed Constitution in between) to agree it involving the democratic governments of all 27 countries (last time I looked there were no dictatorships in the EU) plus all their representative social and economic interest groups, unions & employers etc.
• On balance it’s not a bad deal - it has the Charter of Fundamental Rights; it makes a real stab at agreeing a common foreign policy for the EU and, uniquely, for the first time it has a provision for States to leave the EU if they want to. (On that basis alone, shouldn’t the ‘no’ side be clamouring for a Yes vote, so that they could then set about doing what they really want - pulling us out of Europe?)
• It’s progressive in its overall intent, which appeals to me politically. (Many campaigners on the ‘no’ side just cherry pick individual clauses they don’t like, which is easy enough to do if you choose to ignore any counterbalancing clauses, and the benevolent intent of the wider aims of the Treaty as a whole.)
• If we vote no, then the EU just carries on under the Nice Treaty, which like Amsterdam and Maastricht before it, contains many of the seeds of the Lisbon Treaty. So take the ‘loss of a commissionership for one term out of three’, much harped upon by the ‘no’ side. Under Nice, EU law is that the Commission must be reduced; Lisbon spells out the agreement as to how this will be achieved. In the negotiations on Lisbon the bigger countries, including Germany , France, UK and Spain who had all had two commissioners in the old days before enlargement, argued they should have a permanent presence on the Commission and that smaller countries, like Ireland, could rotate the remaining places on the Comission among themselves. Ireland, and the rest of the smaller countries, held out for a principle of ’strict equality’ whereby every country, big or small, rotates its commissionership. If we reject Lisbon, the strict equality principle is gone with it. The decision on how the Commission must be reduced in size will still have to be made, probably at EU Council level. More than likely, the deal that will emerge will be worse than what’s currently on offer and what’s more there will be no referendum on it because it will all be done piecemeal. Same applies to other institutional reforms in the Lisbon Treaty.
• Since my son was two, I’ve been listening to ‘no’ campaigners telling me in successive referenda on Europe that he would be conscripted into an aggressive EU army when he grew up and die somewhere on some forlorn foreign battlefield; which would be all my fault if I voted ‘yes’. Now they’re telling me that the same thing will happen my putative grandsons. Yeah, right! Same applies to many of the other old tired predictions on abortion, euthanasia, corporation tax rates and so on. Heard it all before and the sky hasn’t fallen in; the opposite of what was predicted in many cases is what has actually transpired.
• I think that the ‘no’ side keep blurring the lines between national sovereignty and our responsibility on a whole range of issues that are strictly within our own control - like privatization of health, education services etc. - and what the EU has competence to decide. I heard Patricia Mc Kenna make a particularly wobbly argument on this in the past couple of days to the effect that if we vote ‘yes’ to Lisbon our politicians might at some stage in the future decide to sell us down the river on the corporate tax issue, or others, and Lisbon will facilitate that.
• From my brief canvassing experience and from conversations I’ve had with others throughout this campaign I formed the impression that the unspoken issue in this vote is immigration. Nobody is admitting it publicly, of course, but it’s there. The Europhiles and the ‘yes’ campaign on Nice are entirely to blame for this - after all, during the Nice referendum they swore on stacks of Treaty documents that there would be no vast wave of immigration into Ireland, with consequent pressure on housing, jobs and schools in certain areas where the ‘new Irish’ settled; and that multi-nationals would not send jobs off to Eastern Europe. They were wrong, very wrong, on both counts and there are a lot of justifiably angry people out there who are motivated to vote ‘no’ this time out. I don’t blame them - they are entitled to feel they were misled about the consequences of European enlargement for us. But I don’t think that cutting your nose off to spite your face is going to be of much help, however justified individual feelings of wrath may be, and which should be directed against our national politicians who failed to make provision for society and services to adapt to an influx of people into the country, not a European Treaty. Lisbon may not be a great deal; but it’s the best on offer and on balance is better than any alternative is likely to be.
• If we vote no, the only people I suspect who will be cheering loudly are the most politically regressive factions in Europe - like UKIP in Britain and minority groups on the extreme right or left across the continent.
• The idea that we might be able to go back and get a better deal on foot of a ‘nop’ vote is a bit spurious. As happened after Nice 1, the first question Ireland’s representatives were asked by the other member states was why the Irish people had voted no. The problem was of course that there was no one clear reason, just many individual reasons. All we got out of the so-called renegotiation was the ‘triple lock’ on neutrality and personally, I’m not convinced that this was the wisest thing we ever set in place.
• Right now, people are a bit down about the economy slowing and the collapse of the property market and the rise in oil prices and all the other stuff that’s putting the squeeze on us. I think a ‘yes’ on Lisbon would help us start to believe in ourselves, that we can keep it together and claw our way out of the current crisis. A ‘no’ would only compound current negativity. Nothing to do with the merits or otherwise of Lisbon, but why bring down a political crisis on your head if it’s not going to do you any good anyway?
Adam, as I understand it, the ERRF isn’t all that rapid at all, but to be honest I wasn’t really thinking about it when I made the post. I guess whether or not it applies to the ERRF depends on whether or not the ERRF is acting as an agent of the European Security and Defence Policy or Common Security and Foreign Policy as set down in the treaty. At any rate, any state can opt out of any ERRF project if they want to, so even if it wasn’t acting in those areas, Ireland’s neutrality wouldn’t be threatened.
FT, Laslo Kovacs may have certain ambitions, but there’s been plenty of other people throughout Europe who’ve had similar ambitions, and those ambitions have never been realised. The vast majority of economists do not agree with you regarding destination taxes, and given that I’m no economist, I’ll accept that consensus.
And as for your conspiracy theory about our elites, well, it’s just a conspiracy theory. Yes, many of the leaders of some of the groups you mentioned will go on to get jobs in Europe, but given the type of experience and expertise required for the eurojobs they end up occupying, this fact is hardly shocking. The notion that the only people active in public life who are not trying to get themselves a cushy position are those who support the ‘no’ campaign is pretty ridiculous.
Veronica, you’re decision seems pretty well-reasoned. Kudos.
The hard form of the neutrality argument usually emerges from the mouths of common village idiots and usually takes the form of some claim about the treaty leading to the creation of a European army.
Yes, and that’s why 450 Irish soldiers aren’t over in Chad being patsies to the efforts of the French to keep their pet dictator in power. (So much for our “proud tradition of UN peacekeeping”, Willie O’Dea’s stock answer to every question about what the hell we’re doing over there)
“Village idiot” yourself, you muppet.
Here’s a trivia question: what’s the principal export of Chad? Answer: crude oil. This adventure in Chad is likely the “energy security” that Harney keeps mouthing off about, but no-one in the media has bothered to enquire further.
The Chad campaign has nothing to do with Lisbon. Clearly, it didn’t require a ‘yes’ vote on Lisbon. It satisfied the requirements of the triple lock protections that Ireland has.
If you think it was the wrong decision to go on that UN mission, then vote for a candidate that shares your views when the next election arrives, but it’s not relevant to any discussion of the treaty.
When all is said and done Lisbon (and the Consitution before it) meets many of the objects to a reasonable degree: clarifies competence, streamlines the institutional framework (removing the Pillars and unifying diverse procedures), enhances democratic oversight, and adds co-operation in a number of areas critical to global challenges that are already clear: cross border crime, energy, and security.
It does all of this in a way that preserves Ireland’s red lines and the voice of small states generally.
Given the time and energy it took to negotiate and how the world has changed since, no significant re-opening is possible. The negotiation is over and we done well.
In the end the only real reason to vote No is if you genuinely believe Ireland will not be better placed to improve the welfare of its citizens in a Europe that is more deeply integrated and coherent. Leaving aside demands here, and a clause there, this is the central question.
why has europe not been in audited in 12 years does this not tell us about the corruption that is at the very heart of the e.u….
the dutch and the french rejected this treaty to and our government were trying to bully us into voting yes for reasons they will not reveal.. brain cowen admitted that he had not even read it on news talk radio, are these the people that are meant to be looking after irelands best interests… i do not also like the way they are saying that europe gave us so much, we entered the e.c with 12 other european states and our success is due to the irish people. europe has helped us that is true, but we have also helped them. let us not forget that. we always seem to hear about europe giving us so much, they also take enough from us.. we are suffering so since they have taking our waters, the waters that we could have leased out for billions of euros, but our government gave it away so easily when if they had of just waited 2 weeks we would have had even more territory to fish in.. now our irish fishermen suffer and their families from not being allowed to fish in our own water…. madness…
europe has too mush power already and we should keep our right to choose in a democracy not a dictatorship.