You deride the no side as consisting of Coir and “lefty fringe groups”, forgetting that it was ever thus in EU referenda before Lisbon, yet the people rejected Nice I. And even going back to the 1987, 1992 and 1998 referenda, where there was no Libertas, and where the much maligned “fringe groups” headed the opposition to those treaties, 30-40% of the Irish electorate who voted still voted against the proposition. There is a strong sense in this country that the Establishment are out of touch with the man on the street on a range of issues including European integration and immigration-controls. Despite their triumph in the European elections, the political-elites would be unwise to interpret the peoples decision as indicative of a collective will to oveturn the rejection of the Lisbon Treaty. I sense a repetition of some of the mistakes of the first campaign, where they argued in favour of a proposition that was not being put to the people – namely – that we should remain in the EU. Well I think they will find that we already know that. But that is not the proposition we are being asked to adjudicate on – namely the Lisbon Treaty – and many of us are waking up to the negative role the Eurocrats have played in this crisis, including the Franco-German interest-rates that contributed signficantly, as well as the importation of exploited migrant-labour – to the housing-bubble by whose end 25% of Irish men were employed in the construction-sector. A dangerous overdependence on construction is what has this country in the state it’s in, and part and parcel of that is monetary-union. The French economy was in crisis in 2005 yet the French did not draw the conclusions that the Irish political-elite are asking us to draw. It may well be that the conventional narrative – that the elites are attempting to rewrite – that in the context of economic meltdown, industrial-unrest and a deeply unpopular government – the people are likely to take out their frustrations at the ballot-box – becomes a harbinger of what will transpire on October 2nd. I have my doubts that an electorate concerned with rising unemployment will want to increase competition from cheap labour by abolishing passport-controls through joining the Schengen Area, as provided for by Paragraph 7(ii) of the 28th Amendment to the Constitution Bill 2009. It should also not escape the attention of the Irish people that since Spain voted for the EU Constitution in 2005, unemployment has doubled to 17%.

Michael, it’s the way I and pollsters are finding that the majority of votes will go. 80 yes, 20 no.