Tories take poll hit after dropping EU referendum

The first evidence that David Cameron's abandonment of his pledge to hold an EU referendum will hit the Tories electorally is provided by the latest Populus opinion poll, published in The Times today.

The poll, taken over the weekend, shows the Conservatives have registered a fall in their support, dropping to 39% - reportedly "at the lower end of their recent range".

Meanwhile UKIP have seen a striking gain, going up from 2.3 to 4.2%. According to the paper, excluding the two months around the recent EU parliament elections, this is "the highest level since 2005."

In another bad sign for David Cameron, figures for likelihood to vote among Tory voters also fell.

This reinforces recent reports and evidence on Tory grass-roots sites like ConservativeHome that the lack of a referendum pledge in David Cameron's recent EU statement is causing hassle for candidates, demoralising the party's activists and driving away potential voters.

Early referendum

When questioned specifically on the referendum issue, the poll shows that 46% said they thought that there "should be a referendum early in the next Parliament on the general issue of Britain's relations with the EU".

A figure of 48% are inaccurately reported as "backing the Cameron line", holding the view that "it would be pointless to have a referendum on Europe unless specific further changes in Britain’s relations with the EU were being proposed."

However, David Cameron is proposing "specific further changes" in Britain's relationship with the EU, yet is not offering a referendum. So, contrary to the report, these people are not backing David Cameron's position but should be taken as also supporting a vote.

In a worrying sign for the party of re-emerging splits on the EU issue, 59% of Tory voters said they still wanted an "early" EU referendum of some kind.

Hung parliament

Peter Riddell comments that if the Conservatives were to win approximately a 10% greater share of the vote than Labour - as shown by current poll ratings - it is uncertain that the Tories would win an absolute majority in the next House of Commons.

Because of the scale of the past three Tory defeats, the party still has a mountain to climb in terms of the seats they will need to win any kind of absolute majority in the next Parliament.

It simply can't afford to throw away support that could make a win-or-lose difference in countless constituencies.

Second thoughts

While it doesn't in itself represent a wholescale shift in opinion, this poll should nevertheless set off alarm bells within the Conservative Party as to whether dropping any kind of EU referendum pledge was a big mistake.

It would be no surprise to us if many thousands of voters are now be thinking: if David Cameron won't trust us enough to let us decide where ultimate governing power should lie, why should we trust him enough to make him our Prime Minister?

While the lack of a referendum commitment may not spark a downward spiral in the polls for the Conservatives, in diminishing trust among a small but statistically significant number of voters in each constituency, it is likely to have installed a glass ceiling of support through which David Cameron will now find it impossible to break.

Could David Cameron's refusal to replace his Lisbon referendum pledge with a commitment to giving people a say on his new EU policy have just cost him a majority government?

No referendum, no trust

Those hoping for a sign that David Cameron is serious about changing Britain's relationship with the EU will be disappointed by today's statement.

Perhaps not so much over its proposals for a confrontational 'Sovereignty Bill' or plans to take back control over some policy areas from the EU.

But certainly over his unwillingness to consult people in a new referendum, and the worrying signals that sends out about the strength of his commitment to securing those changes.

New guarantees

In a speech this afternoon, the Conservative leader set out a new set of policies on the EU, after the final barriers were removed from the path of the Lisbon Treaty into law. These include:

- amending the European Communities Act 1972 to install a 'referendum lock', prohibiting any further treaty transferring power to the EU becoming law without approval by referendum.

- a 'Sovereignty Bill' to "make it clear that ultimate authority stays in this country, in our Parliament". Such a move would put UK law in direct contravention of Declaration 17 attached to the Lisbon Treaty, not to mention ECJ case law, which asserts the EU's legal primacy over its member countries.

This is what led recently to concern in Brussels over a similar assertion made by the German Constitutional Court.

- opposition to the 'ratchet clauses' within the Lisbon Treaty allowing further transfers of power to the EU without the need for a new Treaty. Less significantly, Cameron pledged to "change the law so that any use of a ratchet clause by a future government would require approval by Parliament." But since a government by definition commands a majority in Parliament, such approval would hardly be such a struggle to secure.

The more significant point here was Cameron's statement "We do not believe that any of these so-called ratchet clauses should be used to hand over more powers from Britain to the EU."

- opt-outs from parts of EU social and employment legislation, the Charter of Fundamental Rights and restricting the EU's role in criminal justice. Trying to take back any powers from the EU will cause interesting upheaval. The EU is simply not built to transmit power in that direction - rather, to steadily suck all power to the EU centre.

However, Cameron's idea of "limiting the European Court of Justice's jurisdiction over criminal law to its pre-Lisbon level" is hardly a restriction at all. Since, even before Lisbon was dreamt of, the ECJ had imbued the EU with the power to set criminal sanctions - a definitive power of statehood never set out in any EU treaty.

Confining the ECJ's activism to pre-Lisbon levels will not go nearly far enough, even towards Mr Cameron's own limited own objectives.

Referendum contradiction

However the key contradiction in the Tory leader's statement came when he first decried the need for an alternative referendum on his negotiating aims as having "no practical effect". Yet later said he would consider such a vote at the end of a first Conservative term of government if his negotiating aims hadn't been met.

"If those circumstances were to occur," he said - referring to a failure to secure the opt-outs he seeks - "we would not rule out a referendum on a wider package of guarantees."

But what "practical effect" does he think such a referendum would have at that point, but not either in advance of his negotiations to strengthen his hand, or afterwards in approval of the deal he had achieved?

After all, as we highlighted yesterday, is this not the man who in The Sun attacked Gordon Brown for having the "arrogant belief that he - and only he - has the right to decide what's best for Britain's future"?

The man who said "Giving people freedom and control over their lives is one of the things that makes me a Conservative."

And what more fundamental question of freedom and control is there than to decide for ourselves where governing power should lie?

All about trust

Cameron's proposals contain some interesting steps. From our point of view, they can only be first steps. But a journey has to start somewhere, and at least it appears he is facing in the right direction.

Talking today of the Labour and Liberal Democrat failure to deliver a promised referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, Cameron said: "It ranks alongside the expenses scandal as one of the reasons that trust in politics has broken down" - echoing a point the DM was making on this blog back in June.

Yet now he expects us to trust him based only on more words in a party manifesto? It's just not enough, and he cannot possibly expect it to be.

These are very delicate times for trust between politicians and public. Whatever the actual nuances of the situation that the Tory leader explained today, without a new promise of an EU vote, what the public - as the Conservative MEP Roger Helmer put it - are likely to hear at the next election is: "Tough luck, lads. We promised you that you could have a say on the EU, but we’ve changed our mind."

The danger is that the Conservatives will be perceived as 'just like all the rest'.

In David Cameron's own words, from that now infamous Sun article, "the final reason we must have a vote is trust."

Cameron's moment of truth

With this afternoon's confirmation that the Czech President, Vaclav Klaus, has finally signed the Lisbon Treaty, all questions turn to how David Cameron is going to respond.

Klaus's signature, following a valiant resistance, removes the last remaining hurdle preventing the treaty from becoming law.

David Cameron gave a "cast iron guarantee" of a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in an article in The Sun back in September 2007.

In the same article he said of Gordon Brown's refusal to give us a say that "It's the arrogant belief that he - and only he - has the right to decide what's best for Britain's future."

So is Cameron seriously intending to ditch the idea of an EU referendum altogether - and be condemned by his own words in Britain's most widely read newspaper?

Is there any integrity to his broader rhetoric about fixing our 'broken politics'?

Lisbon problem

Cameron's new difficulty with the Lisbon referendum is not hard to see.

Once ratified, the Lisbon Treaty will be merged into the existing EU treaties and become practically impossible to reverse in one go.

Voting weights will change, EU positions and institutions will be created - such as those of the full-time President of the Council of Ministers and High Representative for Foreign Affairs - and the EU's powers will be amended across the broad range of policy areas its institutions now preside over.

The 26 other national governments would have to agree to any changes, and are not likely to agree to reversing all this in one go.

Britain could of course still hold a retrospective referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, even after it's ratified. But at that stage, little practical change could come of the result.

As a symbolic vote, finally putting on public record Britain's opposition to the EU centralisation project, the idea of a Lisbon referendum still has some merit.

But in this 'new situation', shouldn't we be aiming higher than that? Aiming for something that brings about real change?

New treaties

What David Cameron will face, if he wins the next election, will not be the Lisbon Treaty any more. Rather, the newly amended versions of the main EU treaties, incorporating the Lisbon changes across the EU's entire field of operation.

His position, so far, is that in this case "political integration will have gone too far" and "the Treaty would lack democratic legitimacy in this country."

Towards addressing the scale of political integration, he has talked of reclaiming powers for Britain in specific, targetted areas - such as social and employment policies. Areas like justice and fisheries have also been discussed.

In doing so, he could seek to roll back the Lisbon Treaty piecemeal. But such a plan would go further, and reclaim powers conceded in treaties long before Lisbon existed.

More broadly, such a demand would undermine the entire idea and direction of the EU as we know it today.

But we've yet to hear how Mr Cameron proposes to resolve the EU's "lack of democratic legitimacy".

Dangerous path

As the only major party that has, thus far, stuck to its guns in supporting a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, the Conservatives must tread very carefully if they hope to carry over public faith and support to such a new strategy.

Most people don't trust politicians, and many eurosceptics don't trust the Conservatives any more than the other major parties.

What must first be made crystal clear to those within the Westminster Village is that trust will not be forthcoming based alone on fine words in a Conservative manifesto.

We've been there and done that. Labour and the Lib Dems, with their broken manifesto promises, have put paid to trust ever being given again on that basis alone.

Rollback referendum

If David Cameron wants to be seen as a leader - as someone who can be trusted to act - what's needed in tomorrow's policy announcement is a firm pledge to hold an EU referendum of some sort early in the first term of a Conservative government.

If not on the Lisbon treaty, then that referendum should be held on the package of powers that Cameron proposes to repatriate - on Britain's 'new deal' with the EU.

This pledge of a replacement EU vote is the only possible bridge by which supporters of a Lisbon referendum will feel able to transfer from that "cast iron guarantee" to the new policy.

The alternative - a complex renegotiation plan and no referendum pledge - is a path that threatens the Conservatives with internal divisions, agitation by eurosceptics both inside and outside the party, public mistrust and, ultimately, election loss.

Make or break

Cameron's announcement tomorrow might not in itself be enough to win him the next general election.

But if it lacks a replacement EU referendum for the one we were promised on the Lisbon Treaty, it could easily lose it for him.

Who are the real authoritarians, Mr Miliband?

David Miliband, the foreign secretary, has in recent weeks launched a typically New Labour, McCarthyite attack on the Conservative party for teaming up with some east European political parties in the European parliament who are alleged to hold anti-semitic, homophobic and ‘neo-Nazi’ views.

However, since the European Parliament is clearly not where significant power lies in Brussels, the decision of the Tories to team up with East European centre-right parties is of little consequence, regardless of whether or not the claims made against them have been spun in some typically New Labour way by the foreign secretary.

McCarthyite tactic

New Labour, throughout its Peter Mandelson-orchestrated history, has frequently attempted to smear its opponents as being ‘far right’ or ‘xenophobic’ in order to distract attention from the actual substance of the inconvenient political position or claim being advanced.

The foreign secretary in making the attacks he has is merely continuing a long, disreputable tradition, characterised in relation to the EU issue principally by former Europe minister Denis MacShane.

David Miliband’s intention now is to distract attention away from his government’s anti-democratic breaking of its promise at the 2005 general election to let the British people vote on the Lisbon treaty (the cynically re-named European Constitution rejected by a large majority of French and Dutch voters in 2005).

Nor does he want us to focus on the fundamentally undemocratic nature of the system of governance that citizens from all the member countries are being placed under the control of without their consent.

EU's fascist backers

Since Mr Miliband has attempted to create this McCarthyite smokescreen, he should perhaps reflect that, as Dr John Laughland’s book The Tainted Source: The undemocratic origins of the European Union so brilliantly demonstrates, the original project of creating a Pan-European political system was actually enthusiastically supported by fascist movements.

The National Alliance in Italy, the successors to Mussolini’s party and partners in the Berlusconi coalition government, are firm supporters of greater European political union today.

The British fascist leader, Oswald Mosley, campaigned post-war on the slogan of ‘Europe a nation’. The original plans for a single currency were drawn up by the Nazis.

Former French presidents and drivers for European centralisation, Francois Mitterand, Giscard d’Estaing and Jacques Delors were all active for the Vichy government in various capacities. Mitterand even received the Francisc medal from Marshall Petain for his service to the fascist regime.

Fascists were attracted to the idea of a politically unified and regulated continent with a non-elected elite at its core.

New euro-authoritarians

The peoples of Europe today are confronted by a new and dangerous post-democratic elitism - Euro-Authoritarianism - of which David Miliband is one classic manifestation.

Euro-Authoritarianism is self-evidently more subtle than Twentieth Century fascism, and it is not motivated by anti-semitism.

The Euro-Authoritarians do not seek to end multi-party elections, but rather to greatly restrict the parameters within which electorates can make meaningful collective choices.

This is achieved by transferring ever more law-powers to appointed, non-accountable institutions in Brussels and through so-called Human Rights legislation that enables judges to become policy makers though their interpretations of vaguely drafted articles.

The new Euro-Authoritarians are driven by a post-modernist, Third Way ideology. This represents a direct threat to the liberal, anti-colonialist legacy of the European Enlightenment and the idea that sovereignty should reside with national communities of people rather than unaccountable elites.

Mr Miliband and his associates in New Labour today are working to create an elitist, post-democratic political system based in Brussels that does not accord with the rule of law and can by-pass parliamentary and public accountability.

The Euro-Authoritarians fear the concept of popular democracy, hence their hysterical denunciations of the idea that voters should be allowed to directly determine important issues by referendum.

The New Euro-Authoritarians support…

…preventing the peoples of the EU member states having a direct democratic say regarding whether or not new law-making powers should be centralised in Brussels. When the French and Dutch voters overwhelmingly rejected the Lisbon treaty (then named the EU Constitution) their wishes were ignored. When the Irish rejected both the Nice and Lisbon treaties they were forced to vote again within a year in rigged referenda so that these treaties could be forced through.

…the centralisation of more law-making powers in Brussels. Once directives are passed, no national elected government or parliament can opt to reject or reverse them as the unelected Commission retains the monopoly right to initiate new legislation. Because of the volume of laws emanating from Brussels, most of the measures are passed in Britain through the use of statutory instruments. MPs do not even get the chance to debate them, let alone vote to block them.

…the introduction of a raft of measures designed to increase state surveillance and control. Lisbon will lead to the creation of the Committee on Internal Security (COSI) which will share DNA, fingerprint, CCTV footage and internet surveillance material between security organisations. In May, the EU Data Retention Directive was passed. This enables state agencies to find out what all citizens - not just those suspected of committing criminal offences - have been downloading and who they have been contacting electronically.

The Commission is already funding Project Indect which is a mass surveillance project dedicated to identifying "abnormal behaviour" through CCTV footage and a "continuous monitoring of websites, discussion forums, usernet groups… and individual computer systems".

The EU now has an embryonic police force, Europol, whose officers, like senior EU officials, enjoy, revealingly, immunity from prosecution in member states (Statutory Instrument 1997 No.2973). This body will gain powers of "implementation"of operational powers within the member states as a consequence of Lisbon.

EU citizens can now under the European Arrest Warrant be deported automatically to another member country without any hard evidence having been provided by prosecuting authorities. The Commission has been for many years financing various projects designed to result in the introduction of ID cards, though their formal implementation is still a matter of national law.

…the current undemocratic structure of the EU. In addition to the unelected Commission’s monopoly right to introduce new legislation, the Council of Ministers meets in secret and votes are not recorded. In reality, the vast majority of its decisions are taken by civil servants representing the ministers from the member states in COREPER. European voters cannot hold these bodies collectively responsible through the ballot box.

The executive and the key legislative body, therefore, are beyond democratic account. It is illegal under article 108 of the current treaty for elected representatives from the member states to in any way try to influence the deliberations of the European Central Bank.

Under Lisbon, the political leaders, meeting behind closed doors in the European Council, will be able to appoint a full-time president and foreign minister to represent the Union on the world stage.

… an elitist, corporatist system of politics. The mindset of the EU political class is to concentrate power in the hands of elite bodies representing big business and the major trades unions. Hence, the Committee of the Social Partners which affords elite access to the European Round Table of Industrialists.

The EU model of corporatist politics cuts out ordinary voters and gives a massive advantage to lobbyists from big financial interests, as was seen in the decision to outlaw 300 alternative health treatments following extensive lobbying by Pfizer, Boots and other big companies.

Cowardly elite

New Labour have shown themselves to be notoriously cowardly in terms of openly debating the EU issue, as well as virtually every other issue.

They prefer, as good authoritarians, to speak only at controlled, all-ticket events with no or only planted questions from the floor.

Having made his outspoken accusation in the cosy company of the press that EU critics like William Hague and the Tory party are consorting with ‘neo-Nazis’, does the foreign secretary - who claims to be an intellectual - have the cojones to publicly debate the question of ‘anti-democratic politics’ with Dr Laughland?

We would be pleased to make all the arrangements, including finding a neutral chairperson that both participants find acceptable.

So how about it Mr Miliband?

BBC bias in Lisbon treaty reporting

UPDATE: Tues 20 October 2009

The BBC are at it again with their subtle bias: "His signature is now virtually the last hurdle before full ratification of the treaty, which is aimed at streamlining the 27-member EU's decision making." A completely one-sided presentation of the treaty's purpose, given in the BBC's supposedly non-partisan voice, and therefore not fairly balanced by the critical quote from the clearly partisan Czech President that follows it.

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A flurry of BBC reports surrounding the recent referendum in Ireland has once again displayed the continued pro-EU bias in the BBC's supposedly 'neutral' and 'impartial' output.

BBC stories about the referendum result, discussing what the Conservatives now intend to do about the Lisbon Treaty and on questions about Czech ratification were all peppered with the subtly biased descriptive statements about the Treaty that have featured in many other BBC articles on the subject in recent years.

The BBC kicks off its latest festival of euro bias just a few paragraphs into the piece reporting the result of the Irish vote, by declaring: "The treaty - which is aimed at streamlining decision-making in the 27-nation bloc - ... "

This is of course an abjectly pro-EU 'government line' description of the purpose of the treaty, with which the treaty's critics would profoundly disagree.

We, for example, would argue that the treaty's only purpose is to continue the EU political integration project, by transferring more decision-making powers from national governments and parliaments to undemocratic EU institutions. And to establish for the EU further symbols of the statehood to which it so clearly aspires.

Yet there, presented as the view of the 'neutral' BBC, the unalloyed government view sits. Completely unqualified and unattributed, supposedly a statement of impartial fact.

Credibility clash

Nearer the bottom of the same article appears a second, similarly biased statement of BBC 'fact'.

"The treaty is intended to make EU institutions better suited to the enlarged bloc of 27", the article intones. Another 'government line'.

At least, after this second biased claim, albeit right down at the bottom of the piece, the views of "opponents" are finally given a short airing.

But still that is unsatisfactory, as such opponents are being set against not the opinions of the EU, the government or some campaign group whose broad stance can be determined and their view put in context. But the view of the supposedly neutral BBC.

That credibility clash is a totally unfair one on the treaty's critics.

More bias

The same problem crops up in the BBC article questioning the Tory position on the treaty after the Irish vote.

Again, only a few paragraphs down, it is written that the treaty "aims to strengthen EU decision-making processes by using a majority vote, not unanimity, for more decisions."

Yet another completely pro-EU interpretation of the treaty's aims, unattributed to any known EU-friendly voices, and unaccompanied by any balanced mention of the consequent weakening of national democratic structures that more EU majority voting entails.

No mention, for example, of how majority voting allows entire governments and parliaments to be overridden by EU institutions and laws imposed on countries regardless of domestic popular or even political opinion.

Are we really expected to imagine that the BBC considers such trifling details of little relevance or interest to readers? Because if not, what other conclusion is there to draw but that of unthinking or deliberate bias?

No critical voices about the treaty are featured in this article at all. But two quotes - from Gordon Brown and Irish PM Brian Cowen - are included in effusive praise of the treaty.

Third time unlucky

And finally, in an article about the Czech ratification of the treaty, the BBC states without qualification as if it were indisputable fact: "The treaty aims to streamline EU decision-making and boost the EU's role globally."

"Opponents" do get a look-in this time, using the same non-specific line as previously that: "Opponents see Lisbon as part of a federalist agenda that threatens national sovereignty."

No detail there about specific negative treaty provisions that might actually make people question the treaty's merits. Heaven forbid!

Guilty verdict

Back in 2005, in a report the BBC itself commissioned, the Corporation was deemed guilty of an institutional pro-EU bias.

Probably worse than any deliberate bias, of which the BBC was cleared, the report concluded that the problem was institutional because the broadcaster “suffers from certain forms of cultural and unintentionial bias”.

It put this down to BBC journalists often being ignorant about how the EU works.

But a far greater contributor to the problem seems to be the internal perpetuation of an inaccurate cultural view of the EU's critics - a view that is too heavily defined by crude labels used by the government and other EU supporters to try to discredit their opponents.

The most commonly broadcast manifestation of this cultural fault is frequent use of the term "anti-Europeans" to describe EU-critics, with all the cultural antipathy to 'Europe' that term misleadingly injects into what is in reality a political debate about governing structures.

Sadly, on recent form, it seems very little progress has been made in the intervening years to restore the BBC's reputation for impartiality.

Ireland votes on Lisbon treaty

Ireland has voted to approve the Lisbon Treaty in the re-run of the referendum that led to the treaty's rejection last year.

In a vote tainted by irregularities and illegalities - such as blatant breaches of Irish referendum rules requiring balanced media coverage and no public money to be used for either side - the result this time was a 67% 'Yes' vote.

While it's hard to believe that the Irish people voted 'Yes' based on the idea that the economy would suffer further if they refused to give the EU even more governing powers, that seems to be exactly what a majority has been bullied into doing.

The pro-Lisbon camp promised a 'Yes' vote would mean more jobs and economic recovery - the relevance of either outcome to the Lisbon Treaty having been dismissed by even the Irish Referendum Commission.

If these promises fail to materialize - for example, if Irish unemployment continues to rise after this 'Yes' vote - it will be clear beyond doubt that the 'Yes' camp has misled people.

In all likelihood, the only jobs the Lisbon Treaty will create will be in Brussels for yet more former politicians and more legions of attendant bureaucrats taking up new positions in the various EU agencies and bodies the treaty introduces.

That further needless financial burden on the backs of Europe's taxpayers will only delay economic recovery, not hasten it.

Imbalanced campaign

That the 'Yes' camp ran a fundamentally dishonest campaign appears to be widely accepted.

As ever, their chief strategy was to make a deliberate conflation between the implications of EU membership and those of the Lisbon Treaty, and claiming falsely that a 'No' would put Ireland's economic links to other EU member countries at risk.

The last thing the 'Yes' camp wanted to discuss was the the treaty itself and whether it is really necessary for yet more political decisions to be transferred to Brussels.

Whether, for example, it is necessary for the EU to have a full-time President, Foreign Minister, its own diplomatic service, or for Ireland to give up a large slice of its influence over EU decisions.

'No' outspent

This strategy was particularly potent at the present time, when Ireland's economic troubles have worsened considerably since the last Lisbon Treaty referendum.

The inaccurate representation of what the referendum was about by the 'Yes' camp was then rammed home by outspending the 'No' side more than ten times over.

In particular, serious legal questions must now be asked about the role played by the European Commission - a direct beneficiary of the result - which used millions of pounds of public money to influence the outcome in their favour.

The myth still perpetuated by a few starry-eyed EU luvvies that the Commission is the benign 'civil service' element of the EU structure must now be permanently marked 'busted'.

Wrong path

With this vote, Ireland has stepped into the worst of all worlds.

None of the promises made by the 'Yes' side can or will be delivered.

Millions of potential friends among ordinary people across Europe who would have liked to reject this treaty, had they been given a say, have been lost.

Respect will not even be forthcoming from EU political elites, who will most likely be chuckling behind Ireland's back in amazement that their economic scaremongering and shabby trick of empty declarations has actually worked.

Democracy tag team

The baton of halting the onward march of an illegitimate EU State now falls to the lone figure of Vaclav Klaus - President of the Czech Republic.

But even if it passes his final hurdles, the underhand way in which this treaty has been forced through has served to further erode faith in the EU project among those who uphold democratic principles.

Disquiet about how the EU and its backward-looking supporters amongst Europe's governing class have conspired to deceive people about their intentions and deny people a say on their actions will echo long into the future - long after this particular event is forgotten.

Today, EU elites may well celebrate another step towards this extra level being built on the EU's already lofty powers.

But it has been achieved at the cost of further crumbling the foundations of the EU's legitimacy.

Commission out of control

Is there any more democratically corrupt an idea than a governing institution - which stands to gain considerable extra powers depending on the outcome of a referendum result - splashing millions of pounds of public money trying to influence the result in their favour?

Public bodies using vast sums of taxpayers' money not available to campaigners on the other side of a referendum debate is not just unfair but, more seriously, incompatible with how governing institutions should behave in modern liberal democracy.

Yet this is the situation right now in respect of recent European Commission interventions in the Irish referendum debate on the Lisbon Treaty.

Commission circus

First we had Catherine Day, secretary-general of the European Commission and, if EU-fanatical voices are to be believed, effectively head of the EU’s civil service.

According to the Irish Times, at the beginning of September she "spent the past week in Ireland undertaking a series of media appearances and public-speaking engagements to support the Yes campaign."

Just imagine the outrage if the head of Britain's civil service during a general election campaign spent a week publicly campaigning for victory by one or other political party while still in post.

Leaving aside the political consideration, who paid for Ms Day's trip?

Then along came European Commission President Jose 'dimension of Empire' Barroso, hot footing it to Ireland brandishing the taxpayers' cheque book.

Visiting Limerick last week he pledged just under £13.5m (€14.8m) to 'help former Dell workers find new jobs'.

"I am very glad that the Commission can demonstrate concretely the Union's solidarity with Limerick [...] in this manner," puffed Mr Barroso. Neglecting to mention that the EU had already approved a far more substantial £50m (€55m) grant given to Dell by the Polish government, towards expanding the computer company's operations in Lodz - the place to which the Irish jobs were exported.

Then, as we highlighted here last week, we saw Transport Commissioner (and Commission Vice President) Antonio Tajani joining an invective-strewn 'Yes to Lisbon' flying tour of Ireland organised by Michael O'Leary, chief executive of Ryanair.

Capping it all, yesterday the European Commission paid what has subsequently been confirmed as £139,000 (€150,000) to insert in all Irish Sunday newspapers over 1 million copies of a 16-page pamphlet 'explaining' the Lisbon Treaty.

The pamphlet says "Today, members of the EU enjoy a wealth of benefits: a free market with a currency that makes trade easier and more efficient, the creation of millions of jobs, improved workers' rights, free movement of people and a cleaner environment.

Then claims, even more controversially, "These are major goals. The Lisbon Treaty is designed to give the EU the tools to achieve them", before launching into a rollecoaster ride of serious inaccuracies and major omissions.

This latest wad of public cash spent by the Commission on securing for itself more power was on top of a £1.4m (€1.6m) contract the Commission signed earlier this year with public relations firm Edelman, to conduct a "PR blitz ... aimed at the three groups who voted en masse against the Lisbon first time around."

Action 'illegal'

Reacting to the news of the Commission pamphlet in last Sunday's newspapers, former Green Party MEP and chairwoman of the anti-Lisbon People’s Movement, Patricia McKenna, has sent a legal letter warning the commission she would take out an injunction against any newspapers carrying the guide to Lisbon.

“This clearly breaches Irish law as set down by Supreme Court in the McKenna judgment in 1995 where taxpayers’ money cannot be used to promote one side in a referendum. This guide is advocacy,” she said.

According to Bruno Waterfield in the Daily Telegraph, even the legal services of both the commission and the Council of Ministers expressed reservations the publication of the "citizens summary" of the Lisbon Treaty.

Waterfield quotes an EU official saying: “The lawyers asked if it was right for the commission to produce a summary of Lisbon, before it was ratified and when there was not one for the Constitution."

In addition to Irish law, McKenna also questioned if the commission breached EU law, given that the institution has no treaty-given role advocating the ratification of EU treaties in member countries.

Rules sacrificed

Yet somehow the European Commission is getting away with interfering, using large sums of public money, to its own potential benefit.

The truth is, the EU elite are so desperate to barge their self-aggrandising Lisbon Treaty past this only permitted public verdict that the rules are being flung out of the window.

Vote NO

That the Commission sees its antics during the Irish referendum as acceptable says everything we need to know about the dangerous, pre-Enlightenment era attitude to democracy and the rule of law at the heart of the EU.

Please, Ireland. Today, only you have the power. This is not just a vote about the EU and Ireland, but about Europe and democracy.

For the sake of democracy in Europe. Please stop these people, by voting 'No'.