Irish Election - Coverage of Irish Politics, News and Current Affairs

Stephen Collin’s story in the Irish Times today is one of those ones that feeds into a zeitgeist. Political leaders who have let the Social Partnership talks slip, are in charge of an economic slowdown and on 13 weeks of summer holidays receive their final pay increase today.
TDs WILL receive a pay rise of some [...]

Even before the Irish people’s democratic decision to reject the fatally-flawed Lisbon Treaty, (which would have deepened the democratic-deficit in Europe still further), the source of Libertas funding was a bane of “yes” campaigners. To the elite, the possibility of the ‘mainstream’ parties being so decisively outspent by this upstart pro-business [...]

The WTO talks are a little like the Tribunals. For the most part, progress is confined to a tiny box on page 8 of the Irish Times or Indo unless the leading lights drag it up the agenda. While both are meaningful in themselves and have great symbolic (on the perception of cleansing politics or [...]

The Financial Times’ Brussels blog has a very interesting story about the manouvering taking place on European Commission numbers from next year. As we found out, Nice will govern the makeup of the Commission from January next year - rather than Lisbon.
This means there has to be less Commissioners than there are member states, prompting [...]

[Edit: To say hello and welcome stumblers. Take a look around and tell us what you think.]
The prevailing mantra of Irish and European politicians, still reeling at the Lisbon ‘No’ vote in Ireland, is that we as a small nation cannot hold up the EU. Apparently, if 26 nations have said ‘Yes’ the breaks should [...]

The first poll after the Lisbon result comes with little by way of surprise. The Sunday Business Post/Red C poll finds the Irish electorate looks unlikely to have engaged in a mass volte face with regard to the major parties after Lisbon.
Fianna Fail 40% (unchanged)
Fine Gael 25% (-3)

So the Irish people have said a resounding No to Lisbon. Already the reasons, indeed some of the consequences, are being debated. I have already seen lists appearing on web sites. They hit many valid points : effective No campaign, inept Yes campaign, fears of militarisation, loss of commissioner, bullying tactics from the Euroelite, lack [...]

In a great day for Irish and European democracy, the Irish people, on a higher turnout than Nice II, rejected the illegitimate and anti-democratic Lisbon Treaty by 53.4% to 46.6%. In doing so, they have struck a blow for freedom and against remote, unaccountable and undemocratic rule by unelected bureaucrats in Brussels. They have shown [...]

The people of the country have spoken, for good or ill. That must be respected.
Accordingly, I do not want to see another referendum - the outcome of this one must be heeded. The people are sovereign. The Constitution, deeply flawed as it is, governs this country over anything else; it is the source of power [...]

He was speaking after the no vote and it was very brief. Barroso though did point up the major EU talking point over the next couple of days.
18 States have approved the Treaty and the remaining ratifications should continue their course. European institutions will continue to work delivering for citizens of Europe.

Image by infomatique via Flickr

Anyone interested in making an informed decision on the Lisbon Treaty would do well to read the Special Report by the Oireachtas Committee on European Affairs on the role of National Parliaments if the Treaty is ratified. Published on Friday, it is a straight-forward and relatively brief document which makes for [...]

I’m one of those people who hasn’t quite decided which way they’re going to vote on in the referendum. This is because I haven’t got around to reading all of the text I’m voting on yet. However, there’s one incredibly stupid argument the no camp is bandying about right now. It’s an argument that does [...]

Libertas have an outraged press release accusing the Irish government of a systematic campaign to hide information on the Lisbon Treaty based on what they call “an email from a very senior Irish official to his British counterpart” which the Daily Mail published today. Headlined the Treaty Con, this story is picked up by a [...]

The press releases today were absolutely hopping up and down to make sure everyone was aware that the French Finance Minister and the EU Tax Commissioner should be given no weight whatsoever when considering their comments on a common-consolidated-tax-base.

Simon had given the most recent account of the phenomenon: the government toying with days of the week and seasons when scheduling elections and referenda for political advantage.  Now Bertie has a new twist: a Lisbon vote in June, on a day yet to be scheduled, but in the middle of when many first-time voters [...]

While no date has yet been set, we now have the wording of the Lisbon Treaty Referendum. It isn’t readable, short or simple but it seems to cover much more of the bases than a simple adoption of the Lisbon treaty - designed as it is to deflect worries about creeping EU statism. Even though [...]