No to Lisbon - A Treaty for the Rich

by gav Wed Sep 02, 2009 17:46

On Friday 2 October we will be voting on exactly the same Lisbon Treaty
as Irish voters rejected last year. Not a dot or comma of it will be
changed. Lisbon Re-run

1. Would radically shift control of the EU towards the Big States by
basing EU law-making post-Lisbon primarily on population size, just as
in any State. At present EU laws are made on the basis of a 'double
majority' system - a simple majority of the 27 EU States (14 or more),
as long as between them they have a qualified or weighted majority of
255 out of a total of 345 votes (Art.205 TEC*; Declaration on
Enlargement). Under this system the Big States have 29 votes each and
Ireland has 7. Under Lisbon EU laws would be made by a majority of
States (at least 55%, 15 or more), as long as they have 65% of the total
EU population between them (Art.16 TEU). This change would double
Germany's voting power in making EU laws from its present 8% to 17%,
increase Britain's, France's and Italy's from 8% each to 12% each, while
halving Ireland's vote to 0.8%. Instead of the Big States having 4
times Ireland's voting weight, as now, under Lisbon Germany would
have 20 times Ireland's weight and France, Britain and Italy would
each have 15 times. The Government White Paper tells an untruth when it
speaks of the 'change to a double majority voting system in the
Council' (p.44). A double majority of States and weighted votes already
exists for EU laws. What Lisbon does is to replace the weighted votes
by population size as the key criterion for future EU law-making -
thereby hugely advantaging the Big EU States at the expense of the
Small.

2. Would abolish our present right to 'propose' and decide who Ireland's
Commissioner is (Art 214 TEC), by replacing it with a right to make
'suggestions' only for the incoming Commission President and the Big
States to decide (Art.17.7 TEU). The EU Prime Ministers have promised
each State a permanent Commissioner, but what is the point of us
continuing to have an Irish Commissioner post-Lisbon when the Irish
Government can no longer decide who that Commissioner would be? The
Government White Paper makes no mention of this shift from a bottom-up
to a top-down appointment process.

3. Would abolish the European Community which Ireland joined in 1973 and
replace it with a legally new European Union in the constitutional form
of an EU Federation. This post-Lisbon EU would for the first time be
legally separate from and superior to its 27 Member States and would
sign international treaties with other States in all areas of its powers
(Arts.1 and 47 TEU; Declaration 17 concerning Primacy).. In
constitutional terms Lisbon would thereby turn Ireland into a regional
or provincial state within this new Federal-style European Union, with
the EU's Constitution and laws having legal primacy over the Irish
Constitution and laws in any cases of conflict between the two. Ireland
would thus formally cease to be a sovereign independent State in its own
right in the international community of States, and become like a
provincial state inside an EU Federation.

4. Would turn us into real citizens of the constitutionally Federal
post-Lisbon European Union, owing obedience to its laws and loyalty to
its authority over and above our obedience and loyalty to Ireland and
the Irish Constitution and laws in the event of any conflict between the
two. One can only be a citizen of a State and all States must have
citizens. The Irish people were not that happy when they were citizens
of the UK State. Although as citizens of the post-Lisbon Federal EU we
would still keep our Irish citizenship, this would be subordinate to our
EU citizenship and to the rights and duties attaching to that in any
cases of conflict between the two (Art.9 TEU, Declaration 17 concerning
Primacy).

5. Would give the EU Court of Justice the power to decide our human
rights by making the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights legally binding
for the first time (Art.6 TEU).
This would give power to the EU judges to lay down a uniform standard of
rights for the 500 million citizens of the post-Lisbon Union in the name
of their common EU citizenship in the
years and decades to come. It would open the possibility of clashes
with national human rights standards in sensitive areas where Member
States differ from one another at present, e.g. inheritance and property
rights, trial by jury, the presumption of innocence,habeas corpus,
legalising hard drugs, euthanasia, abortion, labour law, marriage law,
children's rights etc. Ireland's Supreme Court and the Strasbourg Court
of Human Rights would no longer have the final say on what our
fundamental rights are.

6. Would abolish the national veto which Ireland has at present in over
30 new policy areas by handing over to the EU the power to make laws
binding on us as regards public services, crime, justice, policing,
immigration, energy, transport, tourism, sport, culture, public health,
the EU budget, international moves on climate change etc.

7. Would reduce the power of National Parliaments to decide 49 policy
areas or matters by shifting their powers to the EU, and increase the
influence of the European Parliament in making EU laws in 19 new areas
(See euabc.eu for the two lists).

8. Would be a self-amending Treaty in that it would permit the EU Prime
Ministers and Presidents to shift most remaining EU policy areas where
unanimity is required and a national veto still exists - for example on
tax harmonisation - to qualified majority voting on the EU Council of
Ministers, without the need of further EU Treaties or referendums
(Art.48 TEU). Lisbon would also extend the so-called 'Flexibility
Clause', which allows the EU to take action and adopt measures to attain
one of the EU's objectives even if 'the Treaties have not provided the
necessary powers', to all areas of the Treaty and not just the internal
market rules as at present (Art.352 TFEU). This would open the
floodgates to more political integration, i.e. centralisation, by means
of this article, which is already widely used.

9. Would permit the post-Lisbon EU to impose its own EU-wide taxes
directly on us for the first time in order to raise its own resources
for the EU itself, without the need of further EU Treaties or
referendums (Art.311 TFEU).

10. Would copperfasten the Laval and related judgements of the EU Court
of Justice, which put the competition rules of the EU market above the
right of trade unions to enforce pay standards higher than the minimum
for migrant workers. At the same time Lisbon would give the EU full
control of immigration policy (Art.79 TFEU).

11. Would amend the existing treaties to give the EU exclusive power as
regards rules on foreign direct investment(Arts.206-7 TFEU) and give
the EU Court of Justice the power to order the harmonisation of national
indirect taxes if it judges that these cause a 'distortion of
competition' (Art.113 TFEU, Protocol 27 on the Internal Market and
Competition). These steps could threaten Ireland's 12.5% company profits
tax.

12. Would enable the 27 EU Prime Ministers to appoint an EU President
for up to five years without allowing voters any say as to who he or she
would be, thereby abolishing the present six-month rotating EU
presidencies (Art.15 TEU).

13. Would militarize the EU further, requiring Member States
'progressively to improve their military capabilities' (Art.42.3 TEU)
and to aid and assist other Member States experiencing armed attack 'by
all the means in their power' (Art.42.7 TEU).
_______

*TEC= European Community Treaty; TEU = Treaty on European Union as
amended by the Lisbon Treaty; TFEU = Treaty on the Functioning of the
European Union as amended by the Lisbon Treaty. These two Treaties
together would become the Constitution of the new post-Lisbon European
Union..

by Fred Johnston Thu Sep 03, 2009 17:29

I like to think of myself as Irish and European. I do not want to be told by politicians two generations removed from wellie boots and pig-shit that my initial decision to say No to Lisbon was the wrong answer and that I am a naughty schoolboy. The corruption we have seen in this country, from bent politicians, brown envelopes, rogue bankers who walk untouched and unharassed by the law, and the economic madness of policies which will tax children's allowances while developers and banks continue to be propped up by the public - nothing on God's green earth would induce me to believe in the worth of a government which has presided for years and still recently over any of this. Nothing they say can be trusted. Fianna Fáil have elevated the art of pig-sty politics to an art-form. John O'Donoghue lobbies politically for his pub-owner friends in Caherciveen and refuses to explain how he spent our money - OUR money - on taxis to different parts of Heathrow Airport on the grounds that he is no longer engaged in politics! And we take this crap, over and over. Yes, I admit it - it will give me considerable satisfaction, my own views aside, to say No to Lisbon 2 and think at the same time that I am getting back at these political cods, naive as that may appear. They have no right to ask anything of me, least of all a vote. For the love of God, will the country NEVER get angry and throw these relics of culchie Ireland out? This dreadful Yeats-terrifying mush of schoolteachers and pub-owners and farmers - will it never be shown the door?

by LightBulb Sun Sep 06, 2009 14:07

From the DAILYTELEGRAPH TODAY
Spotlight and downlighter bulbs next to be banned by EU
Millions more traditional light bulbs are to be banned by the European Union, forcing consumers to buy less popular "green" alternatives instead