Naïve or just plain arrogant?

It takes a really arrogant man to describe himself as being naive, adding immediately that being naive, if you are also ambitious, may not be the worst thing. Sometimes you just have to take your lance, charge downhill and to hell with the consequences.

There was much more sub-military language in Declan Ganley's address to the Henry Jackson Society last Tuesday and in the subsequent discussion; much talk of holding the line, leaving the trenches, the Irish people ("not me, it was the people") being the advance guard that needs the support of the rest of the people of Europe. [And yes, I know, I should have written about it before but other matters intervened.]

In parenthesis it should be noted that as far as Declan Ganley is concerned there is no difference between the EU and Europe and democracy means asking the people of Europe, whatever that might be, though he did acknowledge that there is no pan-European politics as yet. I shall return to this extraordinary muddle in thinking.

Several minutes went on a fiery announcement that he, Declan Ganley, was prepared to make any sacrifice to achieve his aim of restoring [sic] democracy to the European project. There is nothing more "they" can do to him. In fact, "they" have not done much to him anyway, except for calling him names. Big deal! Some of us have had to put with that for some time, on occasion losing jobs for not toeing the line. Hardly great sacrifices, particularly as some of the shocking names he was called were "eurosceptic" and "anti-European". As risk and sacrifice go, facing up to those words does not come very high on my list.

Of course, said Mr Ganley, almost succeeding in looking modest, other people have made far greater sacrifices for democracy. Nevertheless, he managed to draw an implicit parallel between himself and an (unnamed) commander of the Continental Army at Yorktown (not, I presume, Washington) who ordered a devastating artillery fire at his own home, suspecting that General Cornwallis had made it his headquarters.

What there was a shortage of in the talk and subsequent discussion is coherence in Libertas's stance. Just what is it Mr Ganley (oops, sorry he did say call him Declan because Mr Ganley is his father) wants to achieve? I managed to ask two questions, introducing myself as being from EUReferendum, clearly an unfamiliar name to Mr Ganley Declan. Congratulating him on his readiness to make any sacrifice for the cause I wondered whether it might not be wasted.

Even if the Lisbon Treaty fails and even if Libertas gains a large number of seats in the Toy European Parliament, almost all that he dislikes about the EU - lack of accountability, European legislation trumping national, European citizenship - would still be in place. Indeed, they are integral parts of the European project, which Mr Ganley Declan, according to his own repeated comments, supports.

Is he suggesting that the Consolidated Treaties should be torn up and a completely new structure created?

No, of course, not. Mr Ganley Declan is not, he assured us, a revolutionary (though he is ambitious and ready to take risks). The revolutionaries are those who sit in Brussels and create a system that takes power away from the people.

Though that statement had the air of being thought of at the last minute, it is closer to the truth than Mr Ganley Declan suspects - the European project is a revolutionary one. The problem is that it is more coherent than Libertas who seems to have no other spokespersons, gives it credit. To say, as Mr Ganley Declan did, that the problem is the Lisbon Treaty and there is no need for it because we still have the Nice Treaty and then to talk about the need for democracy is to exhibit a terrifying lack of knowledge.

However, he did explain that his main aim in getting himself and others of his ilk into the European Parliament is to ensure that people like me had a voice because at present we have none. They are not listening to people like me. They are not exactly listening to people like him, either, but Mr Ganley Declan obviously has a slight touch of the Obama about him. No, they are not listening and they are not democratic but once he is in the European Parliament, all will change because he is not prepared just to sit there and let business as usual carry on.

I did not bother to ask him what he was going to do about it in the Toy European Parliament because it was quite clear that he saw himself as considerably more savvy and knowledgeable about the EU (despite all evidence to the contrary). In fact, I was waiting for him to tell me not to bother my little head about it because he will ensure that my voice will be heard.

My other question was about the European President, something Mr Ganley Declan finds abhorrent, particularly as the people of Europe have not been asked whether they want one. The people of Britain, he proclaimed in ringing tones, should have a choice in this matter; they should be asked whether they want a European President.

Very well, said I, suppose the people of Britain are asked and vote against the idea; but suppose across Europe the people of it vote in favour; we shall get a European President whether we like it or not. I am sorry to say that Mr Ganley Declan did not answer the question, possibly because he was too busy assuring everyone that he was not a withdrawalist, not a revolutionary and not a eurosceptic. In fact, he wanted to save the European project because if it carries on the way it is going, there will be serious calls in many countries for withdrawal and that would be a tragedy.

This was one of the themes of his talk. The European project, in his opinion has come a long way and must not be undermined by those in Brussels who want to put an anti-democratic spin on it; who are shocked by the fact that people, who ought to be the owners of this project, do not want to march in lockstep with them. If they are allowed to go their own way, the withdrawalists will become strong and the project will disintegrate.

The problem with that is, as all our readers will instantly realize, that the project never had a democratic aspect to it. Clearly Mr Ganley Declan has never read a certain book that the boss and his colleague, Christopher Booker, wrote, in which they clearly explain the anti-democratic nature of the project from the very beginning.

Now, this would not matter if one said openly that democracy is a so-so idea, a recent and not very successful experiment and, maybe, it is best to move on. But that is not what Mr Ganley Declan is saying. He sees himself as the man whose appointed role it is to restore democracy to "Europe" or the European project.

We do not need the Lisbon Treaty, which has all those undemocratic and even anti-democratic ideas in it; we already have the Nice Treaty and can go back to it. Presumably, he has not read the Nice Treaty either and has forgotten that the Irish voters tried rejecting it once but were bullied and cheated into voting it through. Hardly the behaviour of a democracy. No wonder he did not answer my question about the European President.

Furthermore, Mr Ganley Declan keeps talking about the people of Europe and the need for them to have their democratic rights restored and to speak up about the way these are being stolen from them. Those who are doing the stealing, we were told several times, are using the well-tried method of "divide and conquer". They ask the people of individual member states and discard those results if they are not the ones the eurocrats want to hear. Now, if only the people of Europe united and stood up to these dastardly tactics …

Well, what? It seems Mr Ganley Declan does not understand exactly what he is saying. At best he believes in a perestroika: if we change things a little bit here and there the whole project will miraculously become what we always wanted it to be. Except that it was not clear to me or to a number of people in the audience what the aim of the exercise is – just what is it Mr Ganley Declan wants to achieve beyond getting a group of like-minded and woolly-minded individuals into the Toy European Parliament.

He was also very coy about his plans in the UK and one cannot help feeling that he is leaving the putting together of his pan-European list of candidates (the only one, as he proudly explained) very late. Those elections are in June.

COMMENT THREAD

So farewell then ...

The Independent reports that Declan Ganley, the would-be saviour of Europe, has quit politics. Mr Ganley had asked for a recount in the horribly complicated Irish voting system because he thought that some of his votes had been allotted to another candidate. It turned out to be the other way round and the votes, allotted properly put Mr Ganley 13,000 behind the front three runners in the North West euro constituency. (That is, clearly, not the same as the North West euro constituency in England.)

Mr Ganley has rather grandly announced that Libertas was not about him and his return to the private sector will not affect the campaign in the second Irish referendum one bit.

On the whole, this can be described as utter tosh. Mr Ganley made quite sure that much of the campaign was about him. Even if that were not true, his behaviour has done great damage to the cause, damage that it may not recover from.

As readers of this blog know, we were sceptical of Mr Ganley and Libertas.eu both for personal and political reasons. Mr Ganley and the Former British Soldier, Robin Matthews, who led the UK campaign, did little to endear themselves to people who were interested in their activity. (As I said before, I do not take kindly to people who patronize me, unless it happens to be the boss.)

Their political ideas were muddled, (and here) to put it mildly. The idea that there could be some sort of a reform of the European Union through the Toy Parliament, no matter who is elected is laughable in its ignorance of the structure of the political entity they were haughtily explaining to others. (Haughtily but rather vaguely.)

Added to that was the incoherent campaigning that consisted of appeals to eurosceptic groups interspersed with assertions that Libertas.eu was definitely Europhile, as, indeed, it was.

I lost track of the number of press releases I was sent, all of which attacked UKIP. When I asked for a reason, I was told that they were anxious to make sure that UKIP did not benefit from the expenses scandals and, therefore, they had to keep reminding people of such dubious characters as Tom Wise.

This would be logical if people voted solely on the basis of what they thought about the expenses scandal. But that was not so. The fact that UKIP came second, the vote for the various eurosceptic parties added up to a sizeable chunk and the BNP got two seats in the Toy Parliament would indicate that there was a great deal more on people's minds. That is why neither Libertas.eu nor Jury Team did particularly well. It was not simply an anti-politician vote, though there was an element of that.

Finally, there was Libertas's unfortunate tendency to be less than completely transparent in its descriptions of its activity.

For those or other reasons Libertas.eu did as badly as we expected in Britain and 25 other member states. Perhaps a little worse than we expected in Poland. What was rather shocking is how badly the party did in Ireland where the only other one to oppose the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty was Sinn Fein. Did the Irish really vote on domestic issues only or did they feel they had had enough of Mr Ganley and his merry men (and women)?

The answer can come only from someone who is better acquainted with the situation in that country. However, it seems to us obvious that Mr Ganley made a monumental mistake when he allowed his vanity to lead him into trying to form a pan-European party.

Flushed with the triumph of the No vote in the first Irish referendum he ought to have sat back and said that he was interested only in stopping the treaty. This could not be done in the Toy Parliament (a point that escaped Mr Ganley, I suspect) and, therefore, Libertas was not going to get involved in those elections but wait for the second referendum and campaign there.

At most, he should have campaigned only in Ireland, making that into a back-up referendum. He and his colleagues might have done quite well.

Instead, Mr Ganley decided to promote himself and his followers into a band of brothers dedicated to the salvation and reform of the European project. They failed miserably and deservedly. In the process, though, they destroyed Libertas's political credibility in Ireland and damaged, very severely, the chances of a No vote in October when the second referendum is likely to take place. (Smart money is on October 10 but no decision can be taken until the Referendum Bill is passed by the Dail in July.)

The battle in Ireland will be a tough one, made much tougher by Declan Ganley's recent antics and failure. We, in this country, must do all we can to help. This blog is standing by.

COMMENT THREAD

King maker or pretender?

Declan Ganley was in Brussels yesterday, ostensibly addressing SOS Democracy, the cross party group of MEPs in the EU parliament, chaired by Dan Hannan.

He took an amount of flak from a gaggle of Irish journalists and europhiac MEPs who had evidently conspired beforehand to give the man a hard time but, apparently, brushed off the hostility with ease. The Irish Times thus struggled to make a big deal of the meeting.

What is more interesting is the number of side meetings which Ganley conducted while he was in Brussels, where he is also opening an office to co-ordinate his response to the euro-elections. One such was a long lunch with Farage and colleagues, the latest of several meetings with UKIP MEPs, at which former MEP Jens Peter Bonde has been present.

At the top of the agenda has been Ganley’s plan to field up to 400 candidates at the euros, with UKIP wishing to convince the leader of the Irish think-tank Libertas not to stand against UKIP contenders.

However, Ganley is also being assiduously courted by the Tories, with whom he has a greater philosophical affinity – being broadly in favour of the European Union and imbued with the same fantasy that, if only the organisation could be "reformed", everything in the garden would be rosy.

Whether Ganley stands for office (if you can call it that) is very much in the balance. He told the SOS Democracy meeting that he was reluctant to run as a candidate "because he doesn't feel like a natural politician". And he is also – apparently – undecided on whether to launch Libertas as a political party to fight in the elections. He does not anticipate making a final decision before January 2009, which is leaving it rather late if he wants to get a multi-national election team up and running.

That leaves it open as to whether Ganley is to take on the role of kingmaker or pretender. In the latter, he would be up against the combined weight of all the existing eurosceptic and "euro-hesitant" parties, fighting for his share of the vote and open to the criticism that he was splitting the vote and weakening the established parties.

In the alternative role as "king maker", the endorsement of Ganley – widely seen as the architect of the Irish referendum victory – could be a powerful boost to those who gain his favours.

Despite UKIP's advances, Ganley seems more likely to favour the Tories. As Dan Hannan points out in his blog, Declan is "an insistent pro-European" and has little in common with the party. He also tends to the view – somewhat reinforced by Jens Peter – that UKIP is a busted flush.

Interestingly, this was almost precisely the view expressed recently on the other side of the divide, by no less than Alexander Stubb Finland's foreign minister. Interviewed by the Irish Times he professed himself to be "unconcerned" by the prospect of Ganley fielding candidates, seeing parallels with UKIP. "No matter how slick and brilliant Nigel Farage is, the party has become a complete footnote with no influence," he said.

Certainly, UKIP is going through yet another round of its interminable infighting, lovingly recounted by Iain Dale, which is about to leak into the regional press.

If the Tories able to put their weight behind opposition to the constiutional Lisbon treaty and are also able to attract Ganley's endorsement, the premier anti-EU party may not only find itself outflanked and marginalised at the euro-elections, but also crippled by the burden of adverse publicity.

It is probably not an exaggeration, though, to suggest that Ganley could prove a decisive factor, and it will take more than a good lunch with Farage to turn him round.

COMMENT THREAD

A mixed blessing

We've been getting rumours for some weeks now that "a personality" was intending to start up a new eurosceptic party, headed by none of the "usual suspects".

Now, it appears that the cat is out of the bag, with an article in The Sunday Telegraph which has the "hero" of the Irish referendum, Declan Ganley, stepping up to the plate.

According to this article, Ganley is planning to field more than 400 candidates for next June's euro elections, in all the 26 countries – including Britain – where voters have had no direct say on the treaty.

The man claims to be starting to raise £75 million from online donations to run candidates in all 12 of Britain's European parliamentary constituencies, and in seats throughout the EU. As his base, he will use his existing platform, Libertas, turning it from a straightforward pressure group into a fully-fledged political party.

Ganley's message is a simple one: "We will tell people that Libertas is the box you put your X in if you want to vote 'No' to the Lisbon Treaty. It's clear, it's simple," he says. "The message will be: we are now giving you a referendum and it's going to take place in June of next year at the European elections."

The Sunday Telegraph thinks this plan "will unsettle the Brussels establishment," but it is more likely – in Britain at least – that it will unsettle the existing parties. Both the Conservatives and UKIP will be pitching for the eurosceptic vote next June. And like Ganley, UKIP has high hopes of turning the election into a referendum on the constitutional Lisbon treaty.

We have, of course, been here before with Jimmy Goldsmith's Referendum Party in the 1997 general election. But, as he had a fighting fund reputed to be in the order of £20 million, Ganley's £75 million spread over 23 countries begins to look rather modest.

Further, Goldsmith captured the mood of the moment – effectively committing both Labour and the Conservatives to a referendum on the euro. Ganley has no prospect of gaining such a clear outcome. Neither – for all his recent fame in Ireland – does he have the charisma which gave the Goldsmith's campaign its initial boost and had volunteers flocking to the colours.

Ganley's biggest handicap, though – at least from persepctive of the hard core eurosceptics – is that he openly supports the European Union, confining his objections only to the constitutional Lisbon treaty, on which platform we are told he hopes his new party will return 80 MEPs to Brussels. But, in distancing himself from the eurosceptic movement in Britain and setting himself up in competition with the Conservatives, he could well find it difficult to make any progress at all.

The worse case scenario is that he could split the vote, making the euro elections something less of a disaster for Gordon than they might otherwise be. Another possible scenario – if his campaign does build a head of steam – is that he could leach votes from UKIP, robbing it of any chance of getting any MEPs at all for the next parliamentary session.

That makes Ganley's intervention a very mixed blessing indeed.

COMMENT THREAD

A nightmare comes true?

If there ever was received wisdom after the famous Irish "no" vote, it is that the "colleagues" – if they were to have another referendum – would want it before next year's euro-elections. They would be at pains, it was held, to avoid the contest becoming an unofficial, Europe-wide referendum on the constitutional Lisbon treaty.

Now, it seems – at least according to the Financial Times - that the colleagues' worst nightmare is about to come true.

This paper is reporting that the prospects of Ireland holding a second referendum on the treaty before the elections "are receding as differences emerged on Tuesday between parties supporting a 'yes' vote."

This stems from weekend comments by Dick Roche, Ireland's European affairs minister, who proclaimed that a second vote was "appropriate". But both the Greens, members of the Fianna Fáil-led coalition, and the conservative Fine Gael and Labour, the main opposition parties, ruled out the possibility of putting the question back to the people in the short term.

Until this week, says the FT the expectation was that the Irish would put the question, perhaps with a few political protocols attached to reflect Irish concerns, to a second vote. But Irish officials and some diplomats privately concede that it is more likely any second vote will now take place in late 2009.

This may give Declan Ganley, chairman of the "no" group Libertas, the opening he needs to set up his EU-wide political party to take on the treaty – a prospect trailed last July.

More recently, Ganley has been very quiet. He was due to speak at last weekend's summer school but he pulled out at the last minute, pleading "urgent commitments in the US", leaving Fine Gael Senator Eugene Regan to declaim him as "running scared".

If Ganley is not ready to step up to the plate, the prospect of an unofficial referendum in the UK certainly presents UKIP with an opportunity. It could galvanise the euro-elections, especially if the Tory party tries to fight on domestic issues and is unable or unwilling to clarify its position regarding the constitutional Lisbon treaty when or if it gets into power.

In what could be its saviour, UKIP's only nightmare would be Ganley coming up with some serious money and fielding a full slate in opposition to the UK's premier eurosceptic party.

There is, though, the outside chance that the Tories could get their act together and give UKIP a run for their money. On past performance though, their message will not convince enough voters to make the switch in a contest which is now regarded as UKIP's natural hunting ground.

The chance of registering disapproval of the constitutional Lisbon treaty may be so attractive that the electorate will be prepared to resist Tory invitations to make the contest a two-way joust between Conservatives and Labour, in a rehearsal for the electorally mandated reshuffle general election slated to take place the following year.

Time will tell, of course – it always does.

COMMENT THREAD

Rising from the dead

One would have thought that Declan Ganley, after his drubbing in the euro-elections, might stay in his little hole – especially as we heard that he was to quit politics.

The ego will always out, though, and the great man has now re-emerged to take command of the second Irish referendum, giving the Wall Street Journal the benefit of his pearls of wisdom.

For a man who chose a former MoD publicity officer as the leader of his election campaign, and who offered a platform where to describe it as "incoherent" would be an undeserved compliment, to have him on the "no" side is something of a mixed blessing.

The chances are, though, that he has picked the winning side, as sentiment hardens against the “colleagues” and the Irish people realise they are being taken for fools – and have the fortune to have the opportunity to deliver the shamrock version of a Bronx cheer to their masters.

If the Irish people prevail, it will most likely be in spite of rather than because of Ganley's efforts, this dim little man still prattling about being a "committed European." He is not a eurosceptic, not in any way, shape or form, he tells us, chirping that he believes, "that Europe's future as united is the only sensible way forward."

While saddled with Ganley, however, the "no" campaign is able to benefit from the increasingly crass hand being played by the Irish government, which is relying on a procession of visiting commissioners in an attempt to sweet-talk the Irish into believing that the EU can turn water into wine.

If the Irish do fall for this blarney, we will have to revisit all those Irish jokes but, on the face of it, the only jokes currently in town are the Irish government and Ganley.

COMMENT THREAD

Self-destruct mode

There was a sense of unreality in the report last night, headlined: "World hoping for EU global warming deal," another of those lurid misstatements churned out by AP.

However, from the copy, you do get a sense of how self-important our "European Union leaders" are, when the delicious AP tells us that, with "the world watching" our revered "colleagues" were under pressure "to seal an ambitious deal slashing greenhouse gas emissions". At least the agency has then adds: "… while their economies slide into a slowdown."

Strangely, outside this bubble of "climate groupies" one does not see in the rest of the media any indication that this is the world-shattering event that the participants make it out to be.

You thus have to smile when you are told that "an EU deal could galvanize United Nations global climate talks that failed to make progress in Poznan," and then hear Swedish prime minister Frederik Reinfeldt earnestly declaring: "I came from Poznan so I know that they are actually sitting and waiting for a European response."

Another self-important man also pitched in yesterday, with his own concerns – not unrelated to those of the "colleagues", albeit in a different field. This was Declan Ganley, chairman of Libertas, who managed to pack a press conference in Brussels, then announcing that his organisation, which successfully contested the Irish referendum, is now to contest the European elections in 2009 "on a Pan-European basis".

The Libertas website offers the gist of what Ganley had to say, his main pitch being that, "If people want a strong and healthy Europe that is democratic and answerable to them, they should vote for a Libertas candidate."

On the other hand, he says, "If they do not want Europe to succeed or if they are happy with the current undemocratic practises, then they should vote for an incumbent party. For those who weren't given a vote on the Lisbon Treaty, this will be their referendum".

Wrapped in the EU flag, he does of course mean the "European Union". And, in arguing for an EU that is "democratic" and "answerable" he is, unfortunately suffering from an advanced case of barking cat syndrome. If the EU was either "democratic" or "answerable" or both, it would no longer be the European Union but something else.

A surpranational government, which is what the EU is, could not, by its very nature, exist with those characteristics. But then, the tautology implicit in the use of the two words – the second certainly being dependent on the first – suggests that Mr Ganley is more concerned with sloganising than precision.

If anything, though, he shares the same sense of unreality that afflicts the climate groupies, in thinking that what he represents is actually important. The reality is though that EU member states economies are not so much sliding into a "slowdown" as an abyss. Like it not, the economy is going increasingly to dominate peoples' thoughts.

Closer to the reality, therefore, is the news that the Greek riots are spreading across Europe, with disturbances being reports as far afield as Moscow and Madrid. Even in Copenhagen, 32 people were arrested when their protest in support of the Greek protests turned violent.

Needless to say, despite the turmoil in Greece, prime minister Costas Karamanlis has still jetted off to Brussels to attend the European Council, leaving behind him a government with a parliamentary majority of just one seat. That shows where his priorities really lie, but one wonders whether his majority will still be there when he gets back.

What I particularly liked though was a comment in a newspaper, which stated "This is a country with a state that is in a shambles, a police force in disarray, mediocre universities that serve as hotbeds of rage instead of knowledge and a shattered health care system. It is also on the brink of financial ruin." I had to do a double-take to realise that this was the Greek paper Kathimerini, writing about Greece, which it says is in "self-destruct mode".

Greece is not the only country and, with the "colleagues" prattling on about global warming, Ganley about being "democratic and answerable" and our own local politicians about who knows what (or cares), it seems the whole political class is set to follow.

COMMENT THREAD

Which one's the democrat?

Excerpts from the transcript of a meeting between Václav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic, and members of the Conference of the Presidents of the European Parliament, Friday 5 December 2008, Prague Castle.

Daniel Cohn-Bendit MEP: I brought you a flag, which - as we heard - you have everywhere here at the Prague Castle. It is the flag of the European Union, so I will place it here in front of you.

It will be a tough Presidency. The Czech Republic will have to deal with the work directive and climate package. EU climate package represents less than what our fraction would wish for. It will be necessary to hold on to the minimum of that. I am certain that the climate change represents not only a risk, but also a danger for the future development of the planet. My view is based on scientific views and majority approval of the EP and I know you disagree with me. You can believe what you want, I don't believe, I know that global warming is a reality.

Lisbon Treaty: I don't care about your opinions on it. I want to know what you are going to do if the Czech Chamber of Deputies and the Senate approve it. Will you respect the will of the representatives of the people? You will have to sign it.

I want you to explain to me what is the level of your friendship with Mr Ganley from Ireland. How can you meet a person whose funding is unclear? You are not supposed to meet him in your function. It is a man whose finances come from problematic sources and he wants to use them to be funding his election campaign into the EP.

President Vaclav Klaus: I must say that nobody has talked to me in such a style and tone for the past 6 years. You are not on the barricades in Paris here. I thought that these manners ended for us 18 years ago but I see I was wrong. I would not dare to ask how the activities of the Greens are funded. If you are concerned about a rational discussion in this half an hour, which we have, please give the floor to someone else, Mr Chairman.

EU Parliament President Hans-Gert Pöttering: No, we have plenty of time. My colleague will continue, because anyone from the members of the EP can ask you whatever he likes. (to Cohn-Bendit:) Please continue.

President Vaclav Klaus: This is incredible. I have never experienced anything like this before.

Daniel Cohn-Bendit: Because you have not experienced me..

Pesident Vaclav Klaus: This is incredible.

Daniel Cohn-Bendit: We have always had good talks with President Havel. And what will you tell me about your attitude towards the anti-discrimination law? I will gladly inform you about our funding.

Hans-Gert Pöttering: Brian Crowley, please.

Brian Crowley MEP: I am from Ireland and I am a member of a party in government. All his life my father fought against the British domination. Many of my relatives lost their lives. That is why I dare to say that the Irish wish for the Lisbon Treaty. It was an insult, Mr. President, to me and to the Irish people what you said during your state visit to Ireland. It was an insult that you met Declan Ganley, a man with no elected mandate. This man has not proven the sources from which his campaign was funded. I just want to inform you what the Irish felt. I wish you that you get the programme of your Presidency through and you will get through what European citizens want to see.

President Vaclav Klaus: Thank you for this experience which I gained from this meeting. I did not think anything like this is possible and have not experienced anything like this for the past 19 years. I thought it was a matter of the past that we live in democracy, but it is post-democracy, really, which rules the EU.

You mentioned the European values. The most important value is freedom and democracy. The citizens of the EU member states are concerned about freedom and democracy, above all. But democracy and freedom are losing ground in the EU today. It is necessary to strive for them and fight for them.

I would like to emphasize, above all, what most citizens of the Czech Republic feel, that for us the EU membership has no alternative. It was me who submitted the EU application in the year 1996 and who signed the Accession treaty in 2003. But the arrangements within the EU have many alternatives. To take one of them as sacrosanct, untouchable, about which it is not possible to doubt or criticize it, is against the very nature of Europe.

As for the Lisbon Treaty, I would like to mention that it is not ratified in Germany either. The Constitutional Treaty, which was basically the same as the Lisbon Treaty, was refused in referendums in other two countries. If Mr. Crowley speaks of an insult to the Irish people, then I must say that the biggest insult to the Irish people is not to accept the result of the Irish referendum. In Ireland I met somebody who represents a majority in his country. You, Mr. Crowley, represent a view which is in minority in Ireland. That is a tangible result of the referendum.

Brian Crowley MEP: With all respect, Mr. President, you will not tell me what the Irish think. As an Irishman, I know it best.

President Vaclav Klaus: I do not speculate about what the Irish think. I state the only measurable data which were proved by the referendum.

In our country the Lisbon Treaty is not ratified because our parliament has not decided on it yet. It is not the President's fault. Let's wait for the decision of both Chambers of the Parliament, that is the current phase of the ratification process in which the President plays no role whatsoever. I cannot sign the Treaty today, it is not on my table, it is up to the parliament to decide about it now. My role will come after the eventual approval of the Treaty in the Parliament. . .

...

Hans-Gert Pöttering: ... In the conclusion - and I want to leave this room in good terms - I would like to say that it is more than unacceptable, if you compare us, compare us with the Soviet Union. We are all deeply rooted in our countries and our constituencies. We are concerned about freedom and reconciliation in Europe, we are good willing, not naïve.

President Vaclav Klaus: I did not compare you with the Soviet Union, I did not mention the word[s] "Soviet Union". I only said that I have not experienced such an atmosphere, such style of debate in the past 19 years in the Czech Republic, really.

My thanks to Anthony Coughlan for passing this on.

COMMENT THREAD

Creatures of the night

Without let-up, the "colleagues" are beavering away in the background, determined to unpick the Irish referendum result. And it is now becoming evident that the repeat referendum scenario – the one most people thought impossible, including this blog – is the front runner in the race to ratify the treaty.

This much has been picked up by The Sunday Times which effectively confirms that the game plan is to deconstruct the objections aired during the referendum campaign and neutralise them.

The paper cites a chilling observation from an unnamed "senior Irish official" who says, "The 'no' campaign will be picked off one by one. Everyone has a price."

Here, although not specifically mentioned, looms large the name of Declan Ganley – the star of the "no" campaign. Although being hailed for his victory, this man is most decidedly not a eurosceptic and the "colleagues" must at least be wondering what it will take to turn this man and get him to support a "yes" vote in a second referendum.

As it stands, the "colleagues" have very little time. They have to get the Irish ratification in the bag before the June 2009 euro-elections, to stop them becoming an unofficial Europe-wide referendum on the treaty. Eurosceptic parties making substantial gains on the back of anti-Lisbon sentiment would be a truly disastrous outcome for them.

Finding the right buttons to press is not going to be easy. One which seems to be taking on some prominence is a threat to block more enlargement unless the treaty comes into force – starting with Croatia. This was aired by Sarkozy at the European Council and is picked up by The Sunday Telegraph, which has Sarkozy being accused of "blackmail".

The trouble with this is that – if anything – blocking further enlargement could well be popular with the Irish, who have taken on a considerable number of east and central European migrants following the last enlargement. It is significant that the areas of Dublin which have been most affected by this surge are those which voted strongly against the treaty.

Nevertheless, the "colleagues" will continue to chip away at the problem until they – or the Irish – come up with the "right" answer, all of which has the Sunday Times leader railing that there can only be one response. "A 'no' vote next time has to be even more decisive than earlier this month. Anything less would be a travesty," it writes.

However, we are dealing here with creatures of the night, who will stop at nothing (until the sun rises). Rightly, therefore, does Booker observe in his column today that the EU leaders and Robert Mugabe have something in common. When a vote goes against them, their instinct is not to accept it but to cast round for how to get the decision reversed.

Our money is still on the "colleagues" rigging the question in such a way as to imply Ireland's withdrawal from the EU in the event of a second "no", a strategy they hope, might frighten off Declan Ganley.

Whatever transpires, the events of the last few weeks have not been without their value. As Booker notes, they have shown that the EU is not just undemocratic but actively anti-democratic.

In terms of popular consent, he writes, this is as bad as Mugabe's determination to cling onto his power - and the haste with which Gordon Brown last week rushed through the last stages of Britain's ratification of the treaty in time to win the approval of his colleagues at Friday's European Council was as degrading as the rest of his part in this shabby story.

But, as they crawl under their stones, ready as the sun goes down for a fresh assault on what remains of our democracy, the last thing that troubles the "colleagues" is a trivial thing like consent. These creatures of the night have no time for such niceties.

COMMENT THREAD

A missed opportunity?

Interesting how, following the triumphal meeting arranged by Open Europe and Policy Exchange on the Irish "no" vote - featuring Declan Ganley – the only detailed report we get is from arch euophiliac Michael White in The Guardian.

Without that, all we seem to have is this (from which photo nicked – ta!).

Perhaps the real reason for the silence is that - as Mr White cannot resist telling us - Declan Ganley is most decidedly not a eurosceptic. Applause, it appears, was decidedly muted when, on several occasions, he told his less than enthusiastic audience that he was "an enthusiastic pro-European".

COMMENT THREAD

And the news is?

"EU trains a new diplomatic corps - without waiting for Lisbon Treaty" storms the Telegraph, with Bruno Waterfield doing his bit to keep us informed.

This is the EU's putative External Action Service (EEAS), with five hundred and thirty staff from the EU commission having already begun training to build a "shared diplomatic culture and an esprit de corps", ready to take over once the treaty has been bludgeoned into place.

Then we get Declan Ganley telling us that: "It is cause for serious concern that, by implementing the Lisbon Treaty, EU institutions are manifesting outright contempt for democracy." He is right to be concerned. As we wrote:

The EU is also forging ahead with a European diplomatic service, officially called an External Action Service, with EU embassies and ambassadors in every country to project EU foreign policy and issue EU visas. The service, which some governments hope will replace national diplomatic services, will answer to the European foreign minister, a post created by the constitution, but to which Javier Solana, the EU's current head of foreign policy, has already been appointed.

Officials have been told by member governments to start laying the groundwork for the European diplomatic service. One official said the work was continuing: "We are in limbo, but we are carrying on. What else can you do right now?" A British government spokesman said, however: "The external action service does not exist. The only thing happening is preparatory work, and it will not come into being without a treaty."

The only thing is that we wrote this on 8 June 2005, based on a story in The Times. In December 2005, there was further evidence that the EU was implementing the constitutional treaty and, as we know from COM(2006)712 final, it has been actively plotting to take over embassy functions for some considerable time.

This is simply the tip of the iceberg, just another step in the slow process of integration. There is no point in complaining about it – this is what the EU does. The EU, by its very nature, by the very fact that it exists, makes it contemptuous of democracy. It is there to destroy democracy. The only option is to get out.

What is different, of course, is that we are coming up to the euro-elections. So we not only have Ganley pitching in, the Conservatives are also staking a claim.

We thus have Mark Francois, the Conservative spokesman on the EU, declaring: "This project shows just how much more power Brussels would gain over our foreign policy. It is outrageous that the British people are being denied any say over it. That's why the Conservatives will be campaigning for a referendum in the European elections."

And when the election is over, the parties will go back to sleep and we will hear no more until it is convenient to raise it again … when plans will be even further advanced. Nothing else will have changed.

COMMENT THREAD

Muddled thinking

Having expressed a certain lack of enthusiasm for the great Declan Ganley, I did go with interest to the launch of the Libertas's electoral campaign in the UK.

The press conference was not as well attended as I would have expected. When Kilroy Silk launched Veritas in 2005, there was barely standing room in the big hall in One Great George Street and the main media had sent their big guns.

This launch was thinly attended though I gather from Mark Mardell's blog on the BBC site that he was there or, at least, he had spoken to the leader of the campaign, Robin Matthews, described as a former British soldier. Actually, that may have been the previous day as the blog was posted at 10.30 am, the start of the press conference.

A "former British Soldier" is a remarkably coy way of describing a 21-year army career and Mr Matthews was no more forthcoming during the press conference, saying merely that he had served in Bosnia, Sierra Leone and Afghanistan. Mr Ganley also added in ringing tones (he is good at ringing tones) how ironic it was that Mr Matthews has travelled round the world as a British soldier "championing the values of democracy" only to find them being eroded at home.

Yes, that is ironic, all right and one is glad that Mr Matthews has understood this but one is not too sure that he knows quite what to do with that understanding.

The rest of this long and long-delayed analysis of Libertas UK and its launch is over on Eureferendum2. Enjoy.

COMMENT THREAD

Wooops ...

Libertas, having launched its UK campaign a few days ago, has run into a spot of bother. As my co-editor mentioned, "three UKIPers" had beaten the party to the draw and registered the name with the Electoral Commission. Actually, the three are Bridget Rowe, Damian Wilson and Mick Greenhough, the former an ex-tabloid editor, reported to be friendly with Nigel Farage. They did this in December, taking, as they say, the "as" out of Libertas.

Hilariously, the desperate (but not that desperate) Ganley crew has offered them £2,000 for the complete thing. The three have so far declined, saying they are not interested in the money. Should Ganley add a few noughts, or should he be looking for a different name?

COMMENT THREAD

It's happening all over

The Labour Party won the European Parliament elections by a landslide, garnering 57 percent of the first count votes. That is the news from Malta, based on early samples taken as the sorting of votes started.

Thus, while we (or some of us) are immersed in the train wreck that is British politics, awaiting tonight's results which will tell us how badly the government party has fared, this is an early sign that there is a significant anti-government movement sweeping the whole of EUrope.

Everywhere, it seems government parties are braced to take heavy losses at the polls and, with the citizens of 19 of the 27 EU member states going through the charade today of electing MEPs, poor turnouts are being reported which further intensifies this expected trend.

José Manuel thingy has been jumping up and down in his native Portugal, exhorting "European citizens" to head for the ballot boxes to elect an EU parliament, his reward being a turnout which is expected to fall below the 45.5 percent record (for low turnouts).

As well as Malta, we now see in Holland Geert Wilders' Party for Freedom came second with 17 percent of the vote, winning four seats in the parliament, with prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende's Christian Democrats finishing with less than 20 percent of the vote. Austria may deliver the FPOe a win 14-17 percent of the vote, three times more than in 2004.

In Greece, where voting is obligatory, the lack of enthusiasm for the main political parties is expected to lead to a 35 percent abstention rate. There, the conservative party has a one-seat parliamentary majority in the Greek parliament and, like the UK, an early general election is considered a real possibility if it fails to retain its presence in the European parliament.

Ireland is also set to deliver some interesting results, where we have also seen the results of the local elections and two by-elections, which delivered rebuke to the two government parties. Fianna Fail, the party of Mr Cowen, received 24.55 percent of the first preference vote, 7.5 percent down on 2004. The euros are expected to go the same way, with Declan Ganley's Libertas party expected to exceed poll expectations.

Interestingly, share in some places is as high as 30 percent, way above the 9 percent poll predictions. Says Sean Ganley, brother of Declan, "Clearly the polls have been completely inaccurate but the people haven't allowed themselves to be misled by inaccurate polls."

One wonders if UK polls are going to prove similarly "inaccurate", giving Labour – and perhaps even the Tories – a bigger shock than anticipated. If so, the "others" could indeed be on a roll.

We'll open up a running post just after eight this evening, ready to report the results - with analysis - as they come in.

COMMENT THREAD

Still in a fog

Two press releases from Libertas UK (as they still call themselves) yesterday. Well, at least, they keep themselves busy. I hear, by the way, that Jury Team has had a tremendous website response. People are knocking on the door very insistently or, at least, as some of the pro-referendum demo organizers realized, looking at the website. As a political force that remains ungagable.

One press release is a response to Caroline Flint's highly amusing admission that she had not really read the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty though she had assured us all that the Irish no vote was based on a misunderstanding of that document. How would she know, precisely?

Mind you, there is no call for the Conservatives to crow. I recall similar admissions by Conservative Ministers with relation to the Maastricht Treaty. Memory failure is no excuse in politics.

Libertas's comments about Ms Flint are reasonable enough. Having reminded everyone that Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen had not read the treaty either, they add:

Flint and Cowen can't read it and we shouldn’t have to. Democratic governance should be transparent and accountable, not opaque and elitist.

Not sure what they mean by elitist. After all, is it not the case that we would all like to see better and more intelligent people in politics and is that not elitist? The trouble with the whole Libertas mess is that they are not all that good at drawing conclusions either. The whole purpose of the European project is to be unaccountable – its founders and promoters have not time for democracy but, much worse, they have not time for accountability or freedom either.

That Libertas and its denizens do not understand what the fight is really about is shown by the sentence that follows:

Libertas advocates a peoples' constitution that is clear and understandable.

What is a peoples’ constitution and who actually needs or wants it (apart from Mr Ganley and the Former British Soldier, Robin Matthews)? What is wrong with the constitutional structures we already have? You know the ones that involve the Houses of Parliament or the Houses of the Oireachtas or whatever other legislatures the various countries have, not to mention existing legal systems?

The other press release, rather oddly deals with the … ahem … inappropriate expenses on Home Secretary Jacqui Smith’s account. Libertas, they tell us, are in a position to prove that this is merely one aspect of prevailing corruption that is present in the European Parliament as well as in the national one.

As in London, so in Brussels, where the bloated bureaucracy works for itself, not for European people.

Libertas has revealed that, fresh from awarding themselves massive pay rises and lower taxes, our MEPs have decided to also let their assistants help themselves to even more of our money. Employing family and friends (or even fictitious people) in these roles is commonplace and makes abuse very hard to track, making it easy for MEPs and their associates to help themselves to unbelievable amounts of European taxpayers cash.

I am shocked, I tell you, shocked, not least by the press release writer’s inability to put an apostrophe where it is required. But, seriously, none of us knew that about MEPs until Mr Ganley and his merry men came along. Or did we?

Never mind. Former British Soldier, present UK campaign manager for Libertas and prospective Toy Parliament candidate in the South-West, Robin Matthews knows the answer:

As Matthews explained “Libertas wants the people have their say so that together we can build a Europe that we can believe in. This means holding Brussels to account in order to stop the waste and save money. We need to open up the corridors of power and make the EU work for us, not for them."

Robin Matthews added "How can we expect national parties to hold Brussels to account for its corruption and waste when they are too are busy helping themselves to taxpayers money."

I am looking forward to Colonel Matthews explaining to me what he really means by the EU working for us, not for them. He certainly failed to do so at the launch.

COMMENT THREAD

A whiff of realignment?

The party conference season starts early this year, kicked off by the UK Independence Party which has previously shoehorned its weekend event in between the Labour and Conservative conferences.

And, as always happens when UKIP takes a higher profile than normal – i.e., ceases to be invisible for a brief moment – the detractors leap into breach.

This time, it is the europhiliac Independent but, in its enthusiasm to dish the dirt, it has fallen for an egregious "plant", offering stories of dark and sinister plots against Nigel Farage.

Interestingly, the story prominently features UKIP's erstwhile press officer, Annabelle Fuller, who is styled as an "ally" of Nigel Farage. That is one way of describing their relationship, and has absolutely nothing to do with her complaint, retailed by the paper, about being subjected to abusive telephone calls, "including one at 3am calling her a whore."

More to the point, this Mz Fuller could be the same person who hurriedly departed her post after a confidential and highly damaging video of a mock selection interview – in her custody - had been mysteriously posted on YouTube. This was the one which featured a hapless aspirant MEP candidate, headed, "how not do politics", in an obvious attempt to denigrate the subject. That it was uploaded in Morocco where Fuller happened to go on holiday was, of course, a complete coincidence.

Nothing, as one might expect, appears in the piece about this, nor of the fact that the self-serving Fuller is under criminal investigation by Suffolk Police for an alleged breach of the Data Protection Act.

Needless to say, Iain Dale falls for the scam, aided and abetted by Fuller's former very close associate who has absolutely nothing to do with her complaint about being subjected to abusive telephone calls, "including one at 3am calling her a whore."

Conveniently, the piece gives both Dale and The Independent scope to ruminate on whether UKIP is about to implode. In fact, despite the fond hopes of the newspaper, nothing could be further from the truth. As the line-up at the conference shows, what we have just seen is another internal coup by Farage, still further consolidating his grip on what has become a one-man party.

Out goes current chairman, the independently-minded Dr John Whittaker, to be replaced by Farage's 31-year-old bag carrier, Paul Nuttall, one time history lecturer in Liverpool and until recently the MEP's researcher.

He is now elevated to the highest office (apart from the leader) in the party and has been also been catapulted to the lead position on the UKIP candidate MEP list in the North West, replacing the former lead candidate – voted in by the members. This was the regional organiser Gregg Beaman, who was forced to stand down in favour of Nuttall. He has quit his highly-paid job in disgust and is "mulling over" his continued membership of the party.

Nuttall is thus positioned to serve his master well, keeping the members at bay while the next stage of the Farage agenda is rolled out.

For this, the clues were in the keynote conference speech given by Farage, where he spoke of needing a "21st Century relationship between Britain and our European neighbours." UKIP's line, he said, "needs to be less about what's wrong with the EU… It needs to be positive messages about what we stand for and positive messages about what our MEPs will do."

Although larded with references to the UK being outside the EU, this does not sound like a party committed with anything like the same fervour to the policy of withdrawal it has previously espoused.

For an explanation of this, one must look to Farage's recent meeting(s) with Declan Ganley. There, it was made clear to Farage that UKIP's open hostility to the EU stood in the way of a closer relationship.

With the party all but bankrupt, marginalised in national politics and facing a poor showing in the euro-elections, with insufficient cash to finance an effective campaign, the promise of the Ganley millions was enough to spur Farage on to deliver his coded message from the conference podium.

With a covert alignment in the wings, we will indeed hear "less about what's wrong with the EU…" from Farage. And, with The Independent offering stories of dark and sinister plots against the great leader inspired by la Fuller, the stage is set for bagman Nuttall to crack the whip against the real dissenters – the more dangerous of whom were not "fingered" by Fuller.

Hilariously - if you are that way inclined - the Independent, so keen to see the downfall of UKIP, has helped cement it in place, although it will not be UKIP as we know it. But, in that, the paper has perhaps unwittingly achieved precisely what it wanted, neutering the eurosceptic voice. Only time will tell.

COMMENT THREAD

The poisonous drip of misinformation

One significant difference between this recession and the last (and the ones preceding it) is the way newspapers are being hit – mostly through a devastating fall in the amount of advertising, although there are many other factors.

Quietly, the big titles are downsizing, reducing the number of journalists they employ. Then, with the burgeoning number of pages and supplements they have to offer, plus podcasts, TV clips and the rest, journalists are actually being asked to do more and more, giving them less time to devote to research and real in-depth reporting.

An important side-effect of this is that, increasingly, the news is not generated by newspapers but by the various agencies. Much of the copy is now simply a "cut and paste" job, with a few tweaks, the less honest of the papers then simply adding their journos' names to the final result.

Where this gets important is that a very few news agencies (and then a very few journalists within those agencies) are essentially controlling the print (and indeed much of the rest of the electronic) media.

Through this means, one sees insidious distortions and simplifications which completely change the context of the political debate. And, like water flowing through the cracks in the dam, they percolate everywhere, finding their way into thousands of print and online journals, influencing the way people think about the world.

By way of example, today we have today a comment by Declan Ganley and Jens-Peter Bonde on the scandalous behaviour of the Irish government, in forcing through another referendum on the constitutional Lisbon treaty. As to what is put to the Irish people, "Not one word or legal obligation will be changed," they say. "The same content will simply be put in a new envelope, just as Valery Giscard d'Estaing said about the change from the Constitution to the Lisbon."

The we have AP briefly reporting on the same issue, under the heading, "EU: Ireland will vote again on treaty next year". This will be repeated a thousand-fold across the world, to be read by millions.

The distortions are well evident, but only to those who know. It tells us: "France, which holds the EU presidency, says Ireland would hold a second vote in return for changes in the treaty." Then, of course, we get the bog-standard formula for describing the treaty: "The document is meant to streamline EU decision-making and boost its role on the world stage…".

As the Ganley – Bonde duo rightly point out – the best the Irish can get is a few meaningless "declarations" which have no legal effect. There will be no changes to the treaty … there cannot be. But this is not what AP is projecting. Its idle simplifications are a complete distortion. They project something which is not true.

As for the intent to "streamline EU decision-making …" etc., we could write an essay on how wrong that is … in fact, we have, several times. But the canards survive, because they are convenient, mindless formulae for the agencies to churn out in their bid to supply the endless pap to fill the pages of the world's media.

At the receiving end, you have production-line journalism, concerned only with filling in spaces – not one whit of sentient thought between copying out the agency text and pasting it onto the virgin page. Worse still, this process is not a deliberate attempt to deceive. But that makes it all the more dangerous.

Media bias, in this context, has never been more real and more dangerous, but the source is not in the offices of the media so much as the agencies which supply them. And their poisonous drip of misinformation is endangering the political process.

COMMENT THREAD

Yessssssss! It's no!

It's over!!!! Final result: 53.4 percent of the electorate voted to reject the treaty, while 46.6 percent voted in favour. All but seven constituencies rejected the treaty, with a total of 752,451 voting in favour and 862,415 votes against. Turnout was more than 51 per cent - better than the second Nice treaty vote!!!

Dublin scores 7-5 against. Outside Dublin, only four constituencies declare for the treaty - with one dead heat. Best result: Donegal NE: 64.7 "no" - 35.5 percent "yes".

Corbett speaks and so does Barroso (see bottom of this post). Despite that, there is no way that the "colleagues" can get round this. Spin they might, but the fact is that, in the ONLY referendum on the treaty, the voters said Nooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Open Europe blog and Conservative Home have commentaries.

OPENING A NEW FRONT: As this is not the end, the beginning of the end or the end of the beginning, a new front has been opened in the war. In a day or so there will be more about the BrugesGroupBlog and the thinking behind it.

The key news as of last night was that the turnout was low. That is what the BBC (and others) were saying. RTE estimated 40 percent (according to agency reports - the BBC said 45). How wrong they were!

In the 2001 Nice treaty vote, a low turnout of 34 percent delivered a victory to the "no" campaign - 54 to 46 percent against the treaty. When the Irish voted again the following year, a turnout of nearly 50 percent delivered 63 percent of the vote to the "yes" camp, with 37 percent for the "noes". Thus does the legend prevail that a low turnout favours the "noes".

The polling stations closed a 10 pm and counting began at 9 am this morning. There was no exit poll. Updates begin here, giving a running commentary on a remarkable day.

UPDATE: French prime minister Francois Fillon is saying that an Irish rejection of the treaty would mean the end. "If the Irish people decide to reject the treaty of Lisbon, naturally, there will be no treaty of Lisbon," he is reported as saying in an interview on French television.

UPDATE: Ireland's major gambling company, Paddy Power PLC, has paid out more than €180,000 in winning bets to people who wagered on a "yes" victory. Paddy Power spokeswoman Sharon McHugh said the company decided a "yes" appeared the likely outcome - despite the low turnout and the fact not a single ballot had been counted - because gamblers inundated their Irish Web site with big bets for a treaty triumph in the hours before polling closed. "All the betting on Thursday night suggests a 'Yes' vote is in the bag, but we could be left with egg on our faces if we've called it wrong," she said.


UPDATE: Cowen and his wife cast their ballots in Mucklagh national school near Tullamore in the Irish midlands yesterday morning. "A referendum by definition, it's about a change to the constitution and our citizens should take that seriously," he told reporters. And the treaty doesn't change ours?

UPDATE: We have received a letter from Anthony Coughlan of the National Platform EU Research and Information Centre, the leading eurosceptic organization in Ireland for many years, with a copy of his media statement. He is, I am sorry to say, not very optimistic about the outcome. Among other things, his media statement says:

Regrettably, this constitutional revolution which Lisbon would bring about in the EU itself, its Member States and in the civic status of four million Irish and nearly 500 million Europeans has scarcely been referred to in Ireland's referendum debate.

The main reason for this is the failure of the statutory Referendum Commission to carry out its function of explaining the "subject matter of the proposal" in the Constitutional Amendment, "and its text", which is what people have been voting on today.

The 1998 Referendum Act lays down that this is the prime task of the Referendum Commission. Yet the Commission has done absolutely nothing to explain to Irish voters how "the European Union established by virtue of the Lisbon Treaty" - which the Constitutional Amendment would allow the State to be a member of, and which is referred to in the first sentence of the Amendment - would differ from the present EU, which was established by the 1993 Maastricht Treaty.

The Referendum Commission has made no attempt to explain the implications for Irish citizens of being endowed with a citizenship of this post-Lisbon Union which is "additional to" their national citizenship, despite its obvious constitutional importance; for one can only be a citizen of a State and all States must have citizens.

Having failed to carry out its essential duty as laid down in the Referendum Act, the Referendum Commission through its chairman, Mr Justice Iarfhlaith O'Neill, engaged instead in partisan "clarifications" of disputed matters which were wholly geared to benefiting one side. The Commission and its Chairman have behaved absolutely disgracefully.

We have no doubt that Dr Coughlan's description of the Referendum Commission's behaviour is accurate. We can but hope that his gloomy prediction is less so.

UPDATE: Another message from Dr Coughlan is considerably less pessimistic. He now thinks that, based on the early "tallies" there is a considerable chance that the no side will win. Dr Coughlan is a little on the pessimistic side almost as a matter of principle so this is very hopeful, indeed.


UPDATE: Reuters is reporting that early counting in Dublin is giving the "no" camp a clear lead. Political party monitors known as "tallymen" who watch the count are saying that five constituencies showed the "no" camp ahead, with three evenly divided and one for the "yes" mob. Dublin accounts for about a quarter of the country's electorate and was widely expected to be more supportive of the treaty.

Correspondents for public service broadcaster RTE in other parts of the country also said early counting showed "no" in the lead.

UPDATE: The Irish Times confirms the "no" trend. In Mayo, the vote appeared to be 60-40 per cent in favour of the "no" camp with the majority of boxes counted. There was a 52 percent turnout. Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny and the party's MEP Jim Higgins are conceding that the "no" campaign have won in Mayo.

In the Galway West constituency, after the counting of 60 boxes, it is running 54 - 45 percent in favour of "no". Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs Éamon Ó Cuív is conceding defeat for the treaty in the constituency.

In Galway East constituency, the trend also appears to be against the treaty by a narrow margin with most of the 149 boxes opened. In Tuam, the heartland of Libertas founder Declan Ganley, the "no" votes were two to one ahead.

In Dublin South-West, there is a report 60 - 40 percent split in favour of the "no" side. This 60:40 tally is repeated in Dublin North-West, Dublin Central, and Dublin North-East. Elsewhere in the country, tallies from Limerick West indicate a 59 percent "no" vote to 41 for the "yes" campaign. Tipperary South tallies show 50.3 percent "yes and 49.7 percent "no" vote, while Tipperary North tallies indicate a 50:50 split.

Initial tally figures from Sligo-Leitrim suggest a 66 percent "no" vote, Roscommon-South Leitrim indicates a 55 percent "no", while Donegal South-West (55 percent "no") and Donegal North-East (63 percent "no") are also showing an anti-Lisbon trend.

In Louth, the tally split was reported to be a 57 - 43 percent in favour of "no". In Meath West and East, the split shows a 60-40 percentage advantage to the "no" side. In Cork, the trend also appears to be in favour of the "no" vote. Both Kildare constituencies (Charlie McCreevy country) appear to be bucking the trend, with early tallies indicating a 57 - 43 percent vote for the "yes" campaign.

The tallies indicate there has been a strong "no" showing in rural areas and in working-class urban areas, while there appears to be less support for the treaty in middle-class urban areas than had been expected.

UPDATE: David Sharrock, Ireland Correspondent of The Times (London) is also reporting a clear "no" vote. He says: "In Dublin Central, that's Bertie Ahern's constituency, it's going 58 percent "no" against 42 percent for the treaty. Sharrock adds: "I've just been speaking to Garret FitzGerald, a former Taoiseach and very experienced tallyman. He's a fantastic number cruncher and he says that it looks like the "no" vote has won with 55 percent."

UPDATE: Reuters is reporting that France's secretary of state for European affairs, Jean-Pierre Jouyet, is saying that an Irish "no" should not stop other member states ratifying the treaty. "The most important thing is that ratification should continue in other countries and I have good reasons to think that the process of ratification will continue," he told LCI television. "We would have to see with the Irish at the end of the ratification process how we could make it work and what legal arrangement we could come to."

So, the mice are gnawing away at it already. We told you this would happen!

UPDATE: The Irish Times (desperately pro-EU) is struggling to put a brave face on it, reporting: "Dublin Yes vote rallies after early No gains".

This amounts to a strong "yes" vote in County Dublin but a "no" victory in city constituencies and around the rest of the country. Some "rally" - the combined vote in Dublin city and county appears to leaning towards a "no". However, according to tallies, Dun Laoghaire is two to one in favour of the treaty, as is Dublin South with Dublin South East 60 - 40 in favour. Dublin North East, North West and South Central are being called as two to one against the treaty.

Dublin Central is 57 - 43 percent against. Dublin West is 55 percent "no" and 45 percent "yes". Dublin South West is thought to be heading towards a similar margin against, while there are no tallies for Dublin North.

UPDATE: Bookmaker Paddypower has admitted it made a mistake, after paying out more than €80,000 in bets on a "yes" vote. As polls closed at last night, the bookmaker made a decision to pay out punters who had backed a Yes vote after unofficial exit polls indicated a late surge in support for the treaty. The blunder means the bookmaker will be forced to pay out over €180,000 in referendum bets.

In a statement, Paddy Power said: "Last night, there were rumours of an exit poll showing the 'yes' side in the lead and all the late betting suggested a swing in support for the treaty." "It's an unlucky Friday 13th for Paddy Power but a lucky one for our punters," it added.

UPDATE: David Heathcoat-Amory says on BBC Radio 4 that the Conservatives should press for the UK ratification to be abandoned. Some chance!

UPDATE: Ahern says: "We're in uncharted waters." You bet!

UPDATE: The founder of Libertas, Declan Ganley, says: "The Irish people have rejected the Lisbon Treaty. "it is a great day for Irish democracy ... This is democracy in action ... and Europe needs to listen to the voice of the people." Ganley adds that Brian Cowen, "has a mandate to go back to Europe and do the best job possible".

Socialist Party leader Joe Higgins has said the likely "no" vote is a "huge rebuff to the political establishment" but a vindication of the rights of "tens of millions of workers" in the European Union. He believes the "no" side "won the argument", despite the fact that the main political parties and "big business" were in favour of the treaty.

UPDATE: Poland's President Lech Kaczynski's office says he will still sign the treaty. "The president has already said the issue of ratification is a done deal," Mariusz Handzlik, head of the foreign affairs department in the president's office, told Reuters.

UPDATE: Andrew Duff, Lib-Dim leader says, "we cannot accept this result". Corbett on his blog says, "there are 26 other member states whose opinion matters too. It is inconceivable that all of the others will simply say 'too bad - one country has said no to the package as it stands, so let's forget reform and stick with the current system for evermore."

UPDATE: Deutsche Welle reports: "A feeling of gloom and uncertainty fell on Brussels on Friday after Ireland's justice minister said it appeared that the 'no' camp had pulled ahead in the referendum on the European Union's new reform treaty." The eurosceptics, meanwhile, have decamped to Kitty O'Shea's - yards from the commission building - drinking pints of Guiness while they hold an impromptu press conference.

UPDATE: EU commission President Jose Manuel Barroso is still calling on other members states to ratify the treaty. "I believe the treaty is alive and we should now try to find a solution," he says.

UPDATE: Minister for Justice Brian Lenihan says Ireland has lost influence in Europe. He was "very, very disappointed" with the outcome, adding: "I think it is a very sad day for this country and for Europe as well." It was a "serious matter for Ireland," he said, then declaring:"We have to accept the decision of the people… and that's democracy and I accept that."

UPDATE: "By all rights, it [the treaty] should be declared dead," says David Cameron. Gordon Brown is silent. Nigel Farage declares that it [the result] sends a clear message that the European leaders are not listening.

Now the fun begins! An analytical post will follow.

RESULTS: 24 results in (outside Dublin): Waterford: "no" - 54.3 to 45.7 ... Sligo-North Letirm "no" 57-43 percent. Kerry South 57-43 percent as well. Kerry North voting "no" 59-41. Tipperary South has 53-47 percent "no". Tipperary North 50-50. Mayo 61-39 percent "no"! Clare against the trend: 51.8 "yes" - 48.2 percent "no". Donegal North East: 64.7 "no" - 35.3 percent "yes". Roscommon - South Leitrim: 54.4 "no" - 46.6 percent "yes". Cavan - Moneghan: 54.8 "no" - 45.2 percent "yes". Louth: 58.1 "no" - 41.9 percent "yes". Kildare North: 45.4 "no" - 54.6 percent "yes". Cork Central: 64.4 "no" - 35.6 percent "yes". Limerick East: 54 - 46 to the "noes". Donegal - South West: "noes" also win 63.4 - 36.6 percent. Meath East: narrow victory for "yes", which gets 50.9 percent, to the "noes" at 49.1. Cork S. Central: 55.1 - 44.9 for the "noes". Cork North West: 53.9 "no" and 46.1 "yes". Limerick West: 55.4-44.6 percent. Galway East: 53.1-46.9. Laois - Offaly: 44-56.

Dublin Results: ("no" result first) Dublin N: 49.4-50.6. Dublin W: 52.1-47.9. Dublin Mid-West: 60.4-39.6. Dublin SW: 65.1-34.9. Dublin S: 37.1-62.9. Dun Laoghaire: 36.5-63.5. Dublin North Cental: 56.8 "no" and 43.2 "yes".

Pic by Anoneumouse

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