"We Are Treated Like Mushrooms - Kept in the Dark and Fed Shit!"

national | eu | press release Tuesday February 28, 2012 01:30 by O.O'C. - National Platform EU Research & Information Centre janthonycoughlan at gmail dot com 24 Crawford Ave. Dublin 9 01-8305792

DO YOU KNOW that Ireland could hold the Eurozone at our mercy regarding our national debt, the Anglo-Irish promissory notes and the terms of the Troika’s Memorandum of Understanding? This can be done by requiring a referendum instead of Oireachtas approval of the “Decision” of the EU 27 to amend Art.136 of the EU Treaties so as to authorize the establishment of a permanent €500 billion fund for the Eurozone, the “European Stability Mechanism Fund”, to which Ireland must contribute €11 billion?

DO YOU KNOW that approval of this “Decision” is the only thing on which Ireland has the power of veto? This is because if a referendum on approval of this “Decision” were found to be constitutionally necessary, it would put the State in a position to insist on major concessions on all these vital financial matters. Why should the Government throw away Ireland’s best bargaining card in this way? It is the only chance we have to get rapid radical relief for our ongoing economic pain.

DO YOU KNOW that the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) Treaty for the Euro area was signed by the ambassadors of the 17 Eurozone countries to the EU on 2 February 2012? This looks like being brought before the Dáil for ratification on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week, when the Taoiseach reports back from next Friday’s EU/Eurozone summit. It must be dealt with in this Dail session because the 17 Eurozone States have agreed to rat-ify the ESM Treaty by July.

DO YOU KNOW that this is ESM Treaty No 2? It replaces ESM Treaty No 1 which Finance Minister Michael Noonan signed along with other Eurozone Finance Ministers last summer but which was never sent around for ratification. Unlike its earlier version, ESM Treaty No 2 states in its preamble (Recital No. 5) that it is agreed that no Eurozone State will be able to obtain money from the permanent ESM fund which the treaty would establish unless they have first ratified the separate “Fiscal Compact Treaty” which has been pushed by Chancellor Merkel since Christmas. This requires a permanent balanced budget provision or “debt brake” in national constitutions or their equivalent. This Fiscal Compact Treaty, which will probably be signed by the 17 Eurozone States next Friday and which many people here have criticized, does not need to be ratified until the end of this year.

DO YOU KNOW that the Government has invited submissions from the public on this Fiscal Compact Treaty - a most unusual development? This will distract attention from the Government’s failure to insist that the amendment it has agreed to make to Art.136 of the EU treaties requires a referendum in Ireland because it makes a radical change to the scope, objectives and character of the Economic and Monetary Union which the Irish people agreed to sign up to under the Maastricht and Lisbon Treaties?

DO YOU KNOW that a motion to approve the “Decision” of the European Council to amend Art.136 of the EU Treaties + A motion to approve ratification of the European Stability Mechanism Treaty + A European Communities Amendment Bill to bring the provisions of the latter into Irish domestic law, will all be put before the Oireachtas probably on Tuesday or Wednesday week? This is even though there has been absolutely no public discussion on any of these vital matters, and media attention has been concentrated exclusively on the Fiscal Compact Treaty on which Ireland does not have a veto. At a minimum the people deserve a White Paper.

DO YOU KNOW that by holding a referendum in Ireland on the Art.136 amendment to the EU treaties - without which the €500 billion ESM fund cannot be established – we could not only insist on our sovereign debt situation being transformed, but that a better solution to the whole Eurozone economic crisis could be adopted?

If you would like to find out what is really going on, please read the detailed explanation in the analysis entitled "Two Steps to a Fiscal Union for the Eurozone... & A Third Step to Distract Attention from the First Two" - http://www.indymedia.ie/article/101440

The European Stability Mechanism Treaty and the Fiscal Compact Treaty can each be Googled on the Internet.

Anthony Coughlan
Director