marcus

Dead or just badly wounded? Leaders assess toll on EU plan

Brussels summit next week will discuss whether treaty can be salvaged

* Ian Traynor in Brussels
* The Guardian,
* Saturday June 14 2008
* Article history

For the best part of seven years, Europe's leaders have been touring the finest architectural jewels on the continent in their quest to make the EU fit for the future.

Their grand tour started at the Belgian royal family's summer palace in 2001, where they convened to launch a constitution for Europe. Three years later they clinked congratulatory glasses at a Michelangelo masterpiece in Rome, where they signed their draft. By last December a breathtaking 16th century monastery in Portugal provided the setting for 27 heads of government to sign the Lisbon Treaty, successor to the ill-fated constitution, a treaty conceived and rammed through by Angela Merkel, the German chancellor.

And yesterday amid the Georgian splendour of another of Europe's historic buildings, Dublin Castle, their entire endeavour went pear-shaped.

The Irish, summoned to deliver the sole popular vote on the inelegant document intended to rewrite the EU's rulebook, delivered a damning verdict. "It's a substantial no vote on a substantial turnout," said Hugo Brady, of the Centre for European Reform thinktank. "It may be that forcing European integration through grand treaties has lost its impetus."

Andrew Duff, the Liberal Democrat MEP and ardent pro-European who took part in the conference that drafted the treaty, blamed the defeat on a lacklustre Irish government campaign and an unscrupulous populist movement. "It's such a toxic cocktail of anti-globalisers, neocons, the clergy and Trotskyists. Frankly, we're in a big mess."

Drafted in 2007, the Lisbon Treaty was supposed to be implemented in six months' time and 18 of 27 EU countries have ratified it. Merkel successfully crafted it to avoid referendums, but could not stop Ireland because of its constitution.

The idea was to make the expanding EU fit for the future by simplifying and streamling decision taking. There would be a sitting president, a European foreign minister and diplomatic service, and no more national vetoes and blocking potential.

There would be more clout for the European and national parliaments and a smaller European Commission. And a new voting system reflecting the weight of individual countries, but including checks and balances to keep Europe's big powers from dictating terms to smaller ones.

Some of these innovations might still be rescued, but the timetable for Merkel's treaty and Nicolas Sarkozy's ambitious plans to oversee its realisation over the next six months appear to be in tatters, hijacked by the Irish. So, what next?

It's dead

The first scenario is to declare the treaty dead. A summit of EU leaders next week in Brussels becomes a postmortem examination. Legally the treaty has to be ratified by all 27 countries. That is no longer possible in the short term. There is speculation in Brussels that the French, taking over the EU presidency at the end of the month, could pronounce the treaty dead. On Thursday night, the French prime minister, François Fillon, said there could be no Lisbon Treaty with an Irish rejection. But the French are also sending mixed signals and there were signs yesterday that the Germans and the French were moving to head off a premature obituary.

Crisis what crisis?

Many of Europe's leaders wanted the treaty and its new decision-taking regime to end years of institutional wrangling and navel-gazing in Brussels and to get on more effectively with the business of running Europe and dealing with, for example, climate change, Kosovo, what to do about Russia, the global economic downturn, and energy security.

While there will be much handwringing as a result of the Irish snub, there is also a substantial body of European decision-takers, such as Peter Mandelson, the trade commissioner, arguing that the status quo in the EU is not too bad, that the EU is not paralysed, that it has managed to absorb 12 new members since 2004 and its legislative and decision-taking processes are not suffering. Life goes on. Europe will muddle through.

Europe à la carte

A key argument for the treaty, strongly made by Germany, was that a Europe of 27 countries has become too unwieldy. Merkel warned that there could be no further EU enlargement unless the new system was introduced. Merkel is an opponent of two-speed or multi-speed Europes, but the idea has plenty of supporters in Germany and elsewhere. In the mid 1990s her Christian Democrat sidekick, Wolfgang Schäuble, proposed a "hard-core" EU of federalising, integrating states, involving the French, Germans, Benelux and anyone else who wanted to join in. Such notions are likely to be revived. Schäuble still believes that such "enhanced cooperation" can act as a vanguard, with a small hard core integrating policy areas and jolting others into joining in later. He sees a multi-speed Europe as a unifying mechanism, but many others see it as dangerously divisive, presaging the eventual fragmentation and dissolution of the EU.

Sarkozy may be more receptive to this than previous French leaders.

Stuff the Irish

When Giscard d'Estaing's constitution was killed off by votes in France and the Netherlands three years ago, there were plenty of enthusiasts for pressing on among the 18 countries who had ratified it. With 26 out of 27 still slated to ratify the Lisbon Treaty, that argument will be stronger. Why should 490 million Europeans be held hostage by a few hundred thousand Irish voting no? The Germans and the French were said to be pressing Gordon Brown yesterday to conclude ratification so as not to make a bad situation worse. "It's extremely important that the Brits complete ratification," said a Brussels source. "If Brown pulls the plug, his credibility in the EU will be completely gone. It would be seen as an act of treachery."

Brian Cowen, the Irish prime minister, will be called to account in Brussels next week and asked if anything could make the deal more palatable to the Irish. There is no easy answer, nor any single reason as to why the Irish said no. Asking them to vote again eventually cannot be ruled out, although it will trigger outrage and reinforce the notion that the European elites will do what they want anyway.

Politically, the Irish may have marginalised themselves in the power centres of the EU, but legally they cannot be penalised, say diplomats and officials.

For the first time, the Lisbon Treaty contains a clause - aimed at Britain - enabling member states to quit the union, when it was inserted. But there will be plenty of Eurocrats now suggesting that Ireland should perhaps take advantage.

Such an outcome is highly unlikely, not least since Ireland is in the euro single currency zone.
The road to Dublin

2001

December EU leaders meet at Laeken Palace in Belgium to create convention to draft a European constitution. The process is headed by ex-French president Valéry Giscard D'Estaing

2004

October Draft is signed in Rome

2005

June Dutch vote down the constitution by 61% in a double-whammy defeat with the French, who voted three days earlier

2007

January Germany's Angela Merkel takes over EU presidency and makes reviving the constitution her priority

December Treaty is signed in the Portuguese capital, Lisbon

2008

June Ireland, the only country to have a referendum on the treaty, votes against it

kernow

Unfortunately I think it is only slightly wounded! It is now up to we EU sceptics to make sure that wound becomes grangrenous!

Kevin Adamson

Yes, Hit em when there down,The anti EU /Better off out campaigns need to be stepped up

Bob FM

"It's extremely important that the Brits complete ratification," said a Brussels source. "If Brown pulls the plug, his credibility in the EU will be completely gone. It would be seen as an act of treachery." Well Mr Brown are you going to allow an unelected Commission threaten the Sovereignty of Britain and seek to undermine our Parliament. You will Mr Brown be breaking the law if you continue to ratification. The process is dead. Once one State has voted no, the process no longer exists.

Chip

Headlines in Today's Sunday Times. "No10 admits EU Treaty is finished".
Not because we ,the voters, do not want it but because Brown thinks he will be back stage.

ryansoton

Why when we are promised a referendum on the EU constituation, once it was rejected not once but twice in other countries did our elected members of parliament state that as it was dead there was no need to continue with the ratification process but when the same thing happens but we are given a referendum our parliament continues with the ratification process?

Talk about double standards.

ryansoton

We all know that the Irish we have to vote again and again if needed until they get it right!!

In other words vote YES.

I will continue to use my vote to VOTE NO and do my wee lil bit.

Dual passports has its bonuses.

Westcountryman

The treaty should be dead, and we should make every effort to make sure it stays that way.

Asking the Irish to vote again and again until they give the 'right' answer is one option. Instead, I expect they'll try and sneak it in through the back door.

__________________
Manus haec inimica tyrannis ense petit placidam sub libertate quietam - "This hand of mine, which is hostile to tyrants, seeks by the sword quiet peace under liberty."

eublues

Booker in today's Sunday Telegraph seems to take a pessimistic view. Sees the Irish vote on the Lisbon Treaty as the last gasp of democracy within the EU.

Britannist