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Libertas to Launch as Pan-European party today
Read more about: Fianna Fail, Lisbon Treaty, Parties, Social Policy 
Today or tomorrow we hear about the re-running of the Lisbon treaty.
Around 12.00 Irish time Declan Ganley takes to the stage in Brussels and launches the Libertas brand as a cross-European party.They are sending a signal of immense confidence – you need to have the following rules in mind for funding at an EU level if you are to be a successful political party.
It must be represented, in at least one quarter of member states, by MEPS or in the national parliaments or regional parliaments or in the regional assemblies, or it must have received, in at least one quarter of the member states, at least three per cent of the votes cast in each of those member states at the most recent European Parliament elections.
So the idea that he is running hard with a list of winnable candidates is what they will be presenting today, no candidates announced as yet – keep the media agenda for as long as you can by dripfeeding announcements.
We now turn both the summer EU elections and all politics until October into a Lisbon debate.
Libertas will run candidates in every country where the candidates are of a high standard, committed to the Libertas’s pro-European stance and its platform of democracy, accountability and transparency aimed at bring European back to the people.
A detailed policy document will be published in the coming months, and candidates’ names will be unveiled over a similar time frame.
The Libertas announcement coincides with the European summit where the Irish government will announce a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty.
According to Mr. Ganley: “The Irish government and the powerful elite in Brussels are showing utter contempt for the democratic decision of the Irish people in rejecting the Lisbon Treaty. Not one sentence will change in a “new version”. Some non-legally binding texts will be added in an attempt to fool the people. They tried this with the French, they tried with the Dutch, they are trying with the Irish. It’s time to put a stop to this bullying.”
They could do well. Look at UKIP in England nothing on the domestic stage but certainly take a few seats in Euro’s. Although Ireland does not have the same Eurosceptic vibe.
they have a French branch it seems
http://www.libertas.eu/france
Ganley’s got balls, I’ll give him that!
simon i dont know if his irish dimension matters a damn in this case – he is either recruiting from scratch whihc means running a europe wide campaign, a massive demand on a former referendum machine, or he is going to allow canddiates who were running already run under the libertas flag.
if the second he has to be careful who he chooses, as many in Europe will point out eurosceptics have some nasty characters in their ranks. he is now fair game across Europe and most will be much more ruthless than the toothless campaign we saw for Lisbon here.
He needs seats in about 7 countries to get funding, which is an ask.
Here’s a new wrinkle — does Gordon Brown think that he’ll have to re-ratify the treaty if the Irish concessions are meaningful?
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2008/1211/breaking78.htm
Ganley seems to be taking the approach of distancing Libertas from the traditional eurosceptics, i.e. rightwingers, instead framing the new party as one which is promoting the idea of a ‘sensible’ European relationship. This will reduce the toxicity that could rub off on Libertas from anti-Europe parties, maximising the chance of sweeping up votes from across the ideological spectrum. It’ll be tightrope act trying to keep this disparate bunch happy, and it’ll be interesting to watch how they go about establishing a pan-European party and then putting it forward for election in just a six-month period.
This is great news. Those of us who won’t vote SF because they are hard left or have a dodgy past can finally have a choice. The importance of electing large numbers of eurocritical (though not necessarily eurosceptic) MEPs has become more important since the Parliament voted to close down Eurosceptic groups like Independence and Democracy by raising the MEP threshold to 25. If we flood the chamber with anti-Lisbon MEPs, then they will find it much harder to pull fast ones like that. In a democratic Europe, the Eurocritical perspective would be allowed a fair hearing – we represent a large segment of public-opinion in the EU. I implore fellow Irish people to make Lisbon their No.1 issue in the Euro-elections and to return as many anti-Lisbon MEPs as possible to send a message to Cowen that promises are not good enough – we want changes to this Treaty – not just a future one dependent on Croatian accession which is doubtful as only 29% in that country say their favourable towards the EU.
Stalin said: “IT DOES NOT MATTER WHO VOTES IT IS WHO COUNTS THEM.”
Any re-run will be a predetermined stitchup.
Brussels will not lose this time.
“Ganley’s got balls, I’ll give him that!”
and a vagina:
http://www.libertas.co.uk