While McCreevey has generally been a good commissioner for Europe, if he wasn’t there I don’t think it would make a massive difference to Ireland to be honest. Take a look at the Commission at the WTO negotiations if you believe that an Irish commissioner has a strong influence over what goes on in those areas outside their direct control.

There is, of course, a parallel with ministers. Ministers must act for the country on not their constituency, but of course it is nice/a matter of pride to have a local minister (e.g. recent celebrations of Coughlan & Cowen). So, to the No side, yes it’s nice to have a Commissioner but not that big a deal and worth conceding in the long run.

Given that Commissioners act for the EU, and not their country, I am quite sure that you could collate a list of decisions by Charlie McCreevey and his cabinet (or any former Irish Commissioner) which do not necessarily advance our interests nor are favourable to us.

Separately, an interesting point in that HoL Impact Assessment on QMV, which is a big No side issue, is that QMV in new areas can be advantageous in advancing the UK’s interests. Same for Ireland – QMV may count against us in some areas and for us in others (just as the existing system may be better/worse for us depending on the area).

In relation to the Yes side, and particularly TDs, they appear to have little grasp of the issues and arguments. The media/Libertas line that we should all be able to read/understand the Treaty is nonsense: the failure of Yes TDs is not to read the Treaty and memorise references, but to read up on the arguments and justifications/benefits. Instead, we have Gilmore telling his campaigners to “keep it simple” and push the “it’s good for us” line. That’s not good enough.

Let’s take just example the loss of a commissioner, for right or wrong, for good or ill people tend to think that the commissioner is our representative on the commission, and removing that was going to give people pause.

I would ask the question of the Yes side of the last 20 years or so (2009 to 1989) which 5 year period and which set of events and initatives from the commission would you have prefer Ireland didn’t have a commissioner for? If you can’t think of a 5 year period in the last 20 years when we wouldn’t have minded having a voice familiar with the Irish political landscape present and when the issues are known to us how can we think of a time into the future when who knows what issues might arise?

I had no time for the “it’s too large and unwieldy” argument when it comes to the commission because we’re reducing the size by 1/3 i.e from 27 to 18 but as more member states join we can easily see ourselves back up to 27 commissioner in the medium term and then what do we do?

A better idea (I’m not claiming solely credit for this) is to have all commissioners serve 6 years with 3 as a junior or understudy to a senior commissioner. So half the commission is changed every 3 years, but everyone gets to have a voice all the time. And we end up with half the number of senior commissioners.

You know for a government with 15 ministers and 20 junior ministers to be making the case about being too large is just farce.

There are exciting arguments for voting no; there are good reasons for voting yes, but none are exciting or motivating. It’s just reform, hard to get worked up about. If we had a large electoral, copyright or budget reform bill nationally there would be little interest among the general population; if that bill were put to a referendum, it would likely be difficult to motivate support but all to easy to find bogeymen.

I do think the No side are crazies, and I don’t mind saying so. They are lying, plain and simple. See the Libertas spokesperson in the Times today, banging on again about Lisbon introducing forced detention of children for education purposes. She says Eamon Gilmore needs to read the Treaty/Charter to see where this is. She mentions article 6. Article 6 says nothing about detention, and in fact only guarantees liberty. She might be basing her argument on interpretation or case law, but the way her argument is presented is a lie.

Anyway, I recommend the UK House of Lords EU Committee Impact Assessment of the Lisbon Treaty (and wonder why no such document was prepared in Ireland, where we are voting on the thing). http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200708/ldselect/ldeucom/62/62.pdf It’s a huge document, but you can just wordsearch for “Conclusion” and fast forward through the conclusions.

Money shot: “We are content that the Lisbon
Treaty has no significant impact in the area of financial affairs or
trade policy.”

P.S. Why do people keep calling the EU undemocratic because the other states are not holding a vote? This is clearly a decision only for each member state and the EU has no role/power in deciding whether or not a country holds a referendum. France/Germany/UK may (or may not) be undemocratic, but the EU cannot be tarred with that brush.

Gut feeling opinion polls are never accurate but you can sense a trend and while it may still favour the yes side the no side is mounting a serious, weighted campaign and winning people over who would never have voted no simply based on a vote no for neutrality argument

I think a deep flaw in the Yes campaign was the lack of real non-partisan outside of politics campaign that had people who were just going to argue the case for the treaty and nothing else. I suspect the Alliance for Europe was meant to be that sort of thing but it comes across as too much part of the political establishment. It is worthing considering that each of these referenda campaigns introduces new figures and depending on how they are perceived so goes the middle ground. I’m stumped to think of someone new that has a convincing narrative about this from the Yes side. I’ve a lot of time for many of the people making the Yes case but this is not a battle to be won solely by skilled legal argument.