This first below is cynicism personified. Here’s a senior EU Commissioner admitting that the people of Europe would reject the Lisbon Treaty if they got the chance. They don’t like it, they don’t want it but the Eurocrats are determined that they’ll get it anyway!
But here McCreevy, who clearly disapproves, is so seduced by the money and prestige that he can’t begin to contemplate resigning and leading the NO vote campaign and thus saving both Ireland and the rest of Europe.
They know that if we get the chance we will reject it outright and it is Mandelson’s job to ensure that Brown stays in office without an election until they have the Treaty signed sealed and delivered by all 26 obedient parliaments and the somewhat demoralised Irish people.
The second piece is a remiinder that tomorrow the German Constitutional Court delivers its judgment on the compatability of the Treaty with the German Constitution. Don’t expect anything dramatic - though you never can be sure!
Christina Speight
EU OBSERVER
29.6.09
1. Irish commissioner says EU Treaty would be rejected in most countries
HONOR MAHONY
Ireland's EU commissioner, Charlie McCreevy, has said that the Lisbon Treaty would be rejected by most member states if put to a referendum.
With just a few months to go before his own country's second referendum on the document, the plain-speaking former finance minister said 95 percent of the 27 member states would have said "no" to the new institutional rules if it had been put to a vote.
The commissioner, in charge of the internal market, reckons all leaders know this and it is only officials working in the EU institutions who have unrealistic expectations about the popularity of the treaty, designed to streamline how the EU functions and removing the unanimity requirement for decision-making in most policy areas.
"When Irish people rejected the Lisbon Treaty a year ago, the initial reaction ranged from shock to horror to temper to vexation. That would be the view of a lot of the people who live in the Brussels beltway," he told the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Ireland on Friday (26 June), reports the Irish Times.
"On the other hand, all of the [political leaders] know quite well that if the similar question was put to their electorate by a referendum the answer in 95 per cent of the countries would probably have been 'No' as well."
"I have always divided the reaction between those two forces: those within the beltway, the 'fonctionnaires', those who gasp with horror [on the one hand] and the heads of state, who are far more realistic. They are glad they didn't have to put the question themselves to their people."
Ireland rejected the Lisbon Treaty in a referendum a year ago. In the run up to that vote, Mr McCreevy stole the headlines by saying he had not read the treaty from cover to cover and that no "sane" person had done so.
His admission prompted Irish journalists to ask other politicians about whether they had done their Lisbon homework, eventually exposing the fact that Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen had not read it either.
This time round, Irish voters, shaken by the devastating effects the economic crisis has had on the country, are thought more like to vote "Yes". Recent polls have indicated a majority intend to give the green light to the document,
At a summit earlier in June, EU leaders agreed to a set of guarantees on the Lisbon Treaty designed to persuade voters to say "Yes".
The treaty needs to be approved by all member states before going into force. Ratification has also not yet been completed in Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic, where the president of all three countries have to sign the document.
2. Germany's top court to decide on EU treaty
HONOR MAHONY
BRUSSELS - Germany's top court will on Tuesday (30 June) decide whether the EU's new treaty is compatible with the country's constitution in a judgement that is keenly awaited throughout the rest of the bloc.
The constitutional court will at 10am CET deliver a ruling examining a series of complaints that suggest that the treaty, some six years in the making, would undermine the German parliament and the country's sovereignty as well as transfer too many powers to the EU but not make it democratic enough.
The judges involved in the case held a two-day hearing in February, to which Berlin sent foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and interior minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, to make the treaty's case.
Some of the judges expressed some scepticism during the hearing about whether the treaty ensures more democracy for the EU's citizens, and they had reservations about the number of powers that will be transferred to the EU level under the treaty and the fact that new powers in the future can be achieved without a treaty change.
The court is not expected to give the red light to the treaty, which is strongly supported by German chancellor Angela Merkel. Instead, it is set to give the go ahead to the complete ratification of the text, but with certain conditions.
German newspapers suggest the court will say that future transferral of power to Brussels should only be allowed after the approval of the Bundestag (parliament) and that the constitutional court itself should watch over this process.
The constitutional court ruled on a similar complaint in 1993 over the Maastricht Treaty, which paved the way to the creation of the euro.
At the time it ruled the treaty compatible with the German constitution but said it, the court, should have the last on whether the EU is overstepping the competences conferred on it by the treaty.
If the court says yes to the treaty it will pave the way to the final step of ratification in Germany - signature by the president Horst Koehler. The German parliament passed the treaty with an overwhelming majority last year.
But the overall fate of the treaty in the 27-member EU will remain unclear even if Germany makes the pro-Lisbon move.
Ireland will have a second referendum on it at the beginning of October, while the presidents the Czech Republic and Poland have not yet signed it.
Berlin, along with France, is keen to see the treaty - creating an EU foreign minister and EU president post - in place as soon as possible and is pushing for a 1 January 2010 start date.
It has said progress on other issues, such as further enlargement of the EU, cannot go ahead without the Lisbon Treaty.
Posts
