Reasons to vote Yes

[molloyjh]

Saw this on boards.ie and thought it was worth quoting here:

The Official Yes campaigns last referendum were pathetic, they relied on empty catch phrases from empty politicians who had lost public confidence long ago. The entire campaign was almost vacant of any mention of what was actually in the Treaty of Lisbon and why it is good; you know the real reasons for voting Yes! Due to this massive oversight and the utter contempt I have for the main political campaigns I decided to gather together the reasons I voted yes to Lisbon and will do so again next time. Here are my top 10.


1. Increase of power to the European Parliament
The European Parliament is the only directly elected body of the EU and as such is the most democratic; the Treaty of Lisbon will increase the power of the European Parliament. The parliament currently votes on only 80% legislation, the Treaty of Lisbon increases this to 95%; this is known as the ordinary legislative procedure.[Many Articles, TFEU] The parliament currently only approves 20% of the budget; this will be increased to 100%.[Article 314, TFEU]

2. Permanent President of the European Council [Article 15, TEU]
The current system for President of the European Council rotates between states every six months. The head of government of each state fills the roll; this can cause the President to push his/her countries national agenda often against the will of other states. The Lisbon treaty replaces this system with a more permanent position elected by the European council for a two and a half year term. The new President will be obligated to do what is best for everyone not just one individual state and will act on direction from the European Council. The president has no formal powers beyond co-ordinating the affairs of the European Council.

3. The Council will meet in the open [Article 16, TEU]
At present the Council of Ministers meets behind closed doors. This arouses suspicion in the public as they do not get to see how deals are reached. Under the Lisbon treaty the Councils must meet in the open when deliberating on draft legislative acts providing valuable transparency. Hopefully this will have the added benefit of engaging the public conscious, giving greater insight to EU affairs and raising the level of knowledge.

4. New powers of oversight for national parliaments [Article 12, TEU]
National parliaments are to be provided with all draft legislation and other documents produced by the Commission at the same time as they are provided to the Council of ministers and the European Parliament. There will be a period of 8 weeks before any decision can be taken by the Council and EP to allow national parliaments to provide input. They must also be provided with the Councils agendas and decisions. This enables the parliamentary opposition a chance confront the government on its activities at the EU.

5. More clearly defines the competences of the Union & Enshrines the principal of subsidiarity [Article 5, TEU]
The treaty for the first time clearly defines and sets limits on the competences held by the European Union. Under the principle of conferral only those competencies explicitly conferred by the member states in the treaties can be dealt with at EU level. All other areas are off limits and remain under the sole jurisdiction of the national governments e.g. family law (abortion, divorce), direct tax (corporate tax, income tax).

The treaty introduces the principle of subsidiarity. This means that legislation which falls under the competence of both the EU and national governments will only be enacted at EU level if individual states can’t do so as efficiently or effectively on their own. The national parliaments will be able to interject if it is felt that any legislative proposal does not comply with the principle of subsidiarity. If 1/3 of national parliaments do so the proposal has to be reviewed (1/4 for proposals in the area of Justice & Policing).

6. Introduces simplified revision procedure [Article 47, TEU]
The treaty introduces a new simpler method of amending the treaties in areas of internal EU policy (i.e. concerning the functioning of the EU’s institutions). This method allows for individual amendments to be passed separately without the need to hold an Intergovernmental Conference and draft an entire new international treaty, which is extremely time consuming and expensive. The new procedure still requires the amendments to be ratified by each nation in accordance with their constitutional requirements, which still will require a referendum in this country if it’s not compatible with our constitution. Hopefully this will cut down the complexity of future EU referenda as rather than having to vote on a huge number of changes at once, it will enable us to vote on individual treaty amendments. The simplified revision procedure cannot be used to increase the competences of the EU that will still require a entire new treaty.

7. Increase the Unions foreign policy ability
The Treaty creates a new role known as the ‘High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs’ [Article 18, TEU]. It merges many existing positions including the 'High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy' and the 'European Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy' into one position. This is to provide a more coherent and consistent voice for Europe in the international sphere. Currently there are so many people representing the foreign policy of the EU, foreign governments are confused about who to contact in regards to specific areas and the unions’ voice is disjointed and less coherent. The Lisbon treaty also creates an EU diplomatic corps know as the External Action Service to better facilitate the EU’s foreign policy.[Article 27, TEU]

8. Creates new Citizens Initiative [Article 11, TEU]
The Treaty creates a new avenue for citizens from across the EU to have their voice heard. An initiative requires one million signatures (0.2% of the EU’s population) and then the Commission will, if it is within its competence and in keeping with the treaties, draft legislation for consideration by the Council and the Parliament. The Commission can only draft legislation if the initiative is within the competence of the EU and is fully compatible with the treaties, including the Charter of Fundamental Rights. The legislation will then have to be passed by the ordinary legislative procedure in both the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament for it to become a directive.

9. Charter of Fundamental Rights becomes legally binding [Article 6, TEU]
For the first time all EU legislation will have to be legally compatible with a charter protecting the fundamental rights of EU citizens. The CFR will apply to all EU directives and national legislation which implements EU directives. It will not apply to legislation instigated by national legislatures i.e. all non-EU Irish Law. The CFR does not expand or create new areas of competencies for the EU. It only binds EU from enacting legislation which is contrary to the fundamental rights laid down.

10. Energy and the Environment become greater EU competencies [Article 4 & 194, TFEU]
Ireland has a minuscule amount of power and influence in these areas. The EU can provide better legislation and act more effectively for our benefit than we can on our own. Russia, Europe’s main gas supplier consistently takes advantage of the divided energy market, playing one country against another, cutting off supplies and effectively bullying individual states. Russia will have a much more difficult time if it faces a united EU energy policy, the EU will be the one dictating the terms. The treaty also affirms that combating climate change is a major objective of the Union, which was actually negotiated for by the Irish delegation.


Maybe the reason that the actual changes the Treaty of Lisbon makes garner so little attention is due to the fact that they are pretty mundane, but then Lisbon is a fairly tame treaty in comparison to previous ones such as Maastricht. So I guess my best advice is don’t listen to the media hype who are only interested in selling newspapers and don’t listen to the political campaigns who are only interested in promoting their own political ambitions, read the white paper on Lisbon and refer to the treaty to arbitrate on any contentious issues.

All references refer to the consolidated treaties as amended by Lisbon which can be found here.
*TEU = Treaty on European Union
*TFEU = Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union

For further reading and more detailed information I recommend the 'White paper on Lisbon' prepared by the Department of Foreign Affairs which can be found here.

Regards,
Sink

[He3]

Oh dear.

[molloyjh]

Oh dear.

Wow He3, you read all of that in 1 minute and managed to provide such amazing and constructive feedback.

Surely you can do better than that!? Oh wait, maybe not.

[eurosceptic]

1. Ep remains a dummy parliament as it cannot create laws and can always be overruled by the council.
2. Qmv ensure the big countries get their man who will push their agenda.
3. Already Possible under nice.
4. National parliaments gain no actual power. Only a consultative sole.
5. General flexibility clause is extended to all aspects of eu law so eu can take any power it wants.
6. Simplified revisions would not require a referendum under Crotty.
7. Eu forego policy cannot conflict with nato commitments so the eu will duplicate nato.
8. Welcome but too hard to invoke and commission can ignore the idea. 9. Charter has no rights we dont already have. It is a blank cheque for judicial activism. 10. Welcome but dont im far enough.

[odie1kanobe]

If you Vote Yes we will not come back and try and get you to revote again.

[Freeborn John]

Saw this on boards.ie and thought it was worth quoting here:

9 of these are negative developments. The other does not need a treaty.

1. Increase of power to the European Parliament

Increasing the power of the EU Parliament does not make the EU more democratic. It just means the EU Parliament is more powerful. The EU Parliament has less democratic legitimacy than the institutions (national governments and parliaments) who give up the power under Lisbon that is given to the EU Parliament with a nett loss to democracy.

Increasing the powers of the EU Parliament since 1979 has been accompanied by the growing feeling that the EU is undemocratic. Lisbon simply perpetuates a policy which is known to have failed.

2. Permanent President of the European Council [Article 15, TEU]

The president of the EU Council has informal powers which make him the decisive figure at EU summits. He is the only person to know the negotiating position of all the heads of government (gained through the one-on-one so-called ‘confessionals’). Therefore he is the only one to know the range of possible agreements and can use this unique information to steer the EU Council towards the possible agreements he favours and away from those he personally opposes. Separating such a powerful behind-the-scenes dealmaker from the national governments creates a powerful EU figure independent of nation-states who will emerge as the most powerful politician at EU summits.

3. The Council will meet in the open [Article 16, TEU]

No treaty is necessary for this.

4. New powers of oversight for national parliaments [Article 12, TEU]

… which are toothless. Oversight is not a power. Nor 'access to information'. The only powers worth that name in law-making are the powers to propose, ammend or block and national parliaments have none of these under Lisbon. The EU Commission is free to proceed with its legislative proposals even if national parliaments object to them. Furthermore national parliaments can only object on one ground (subsidiarity). This is pure fig-leaf to disguise that national parliaments (together with the voters who elect them) are one of the main losers of Lisbon who will gradually lose their power to legislate as they are obliged to remove all national laws that conflict with any legislation enacted by the EU under Lisbon.

5. More clearly defines the competences of the Union & Enshrines the principal of subsidiarity [Article 5, TEU]

Subsidiarity is not new and has never worked because the EU institutions that have been the poacher of our political powers (the ECJ and now EU Commission) get to act as gamekeeper and decide if they are taking powers they should not. They are set up as the judge of cases in which they are a party, and will not find against themselves.

6. Introduces simplified revision procedure [Article 47, TEU]

This is undesirable, giving federalists from the Commission and EU Parliament a seat in negotiations to increase their own power.

7. Increase the Unions foreign policy ability

The EU should not have a foreign policy, nor the ability to sign undemocratic treaties binding on all the member-states, nor for its unelected and unaccountable politicians to speak in our name in world instituions.

8. Creates new Citizens Initiative [Article 11, TEU]

The EU Commission will use ‘citizen initiatives’ that ask for greater EU powers as PR for measures it would like to advance anyway. And it is free to ignore anything else that does not suit its instituional self-interest in 'more Europe'. This is the equivalent to petitioning a medieval king for favours.

9. Charter of Fundamental Rights becomes legally binding [Article 6, TEU]

Which adds no new rights which are not already in the European Convention on Human Rights (a body independent of the EU). It does however give the ECJ jurisdiction over criminal law which will be used in the time-honoured tradition by the ‘politicians in black robes’ of the ECJ to use their judicial rulings to build an EU criminal law system that replaces national systems.

10. Energy and the Environment become greater EU competencies [Article 4 & 194, TFEU]

Environment has been an EU competence since the Treaty of Amsterdam. It has not been used to solve global environmental problems as it was claimed it would, but has been used to interfere in national issues such as the rules to be followed when collecting waste from outside people’s houses. A new EU energy policy will similarly not be used to confront the russian bear but to interfere in domestic politics, such as the building of nuclear power stations.

[molloyjh]

1. Ep remains a dummy parliament as it cannot create laws and can always be overruled by the council.

Sources for that last interesting claim? The Parliament does not have the power to create legislation, but it is a very common thing that when legislation is passed down to them and they suggest amendments those amendments are made. Also given that they are the approvers of most legislation and have the power to block the appointment of Commissioners they could hardly be considered a dummy Parliament.

2. Qmv ensure the big countries get their man who will push their agenda.

Really? How so? Any sources?

3. Already Possible under nice.

Possible, but not mandatory. Currently they operate behind closed doors as this is also possible under Nice.

4. National parliaments gain no actual power. Only a consultative sole.

True, but as with the Parliament their feedback is taken seriously.

5. General flexibility clause is extended to all aspects of eu law so eu can take any power it wants.

Really? How so? Sources? That's one hell of a claim, and to be fair from everything I have read, which includes a good deal of the Treaty itself, fanciful in the extreme.

6. Simplified revisions would not require a referendum under Crotty.

True for revisions that do not impact our Constitution. That is down to our constitutional system though and not Lisbon. If we were to alter our Constitution we could have it whatever way we want. So this point is a domestic issue, not a Lisbon issue.

7. Eu forego policy cannot conflict with nato commitments so the eu will duplicate nato.

No it won't. Why would it do that? It cannot conflict with NATO, so NATO takes precedence. In situations where NATO has no involvement then the EU could get involved itself, so long as it is not working against NATO. You've a very bizarre interpretation of that aspect.

8. Welcome but too hard to invoke and commission can ignore the idea.

I would argue it is too easy to invoke. 1 million signatures is 0.2% of the population of the EU. You could get that fairly easily these days. And of course the Commission can ignore it. I wouldn't want 0.2% of the EU able to dictate EU direction, especially seeing as you could easily get that many nut-jobs in such a large population.

9. Charter has no rights we dont already have. It is a blank cheque for judicial activism.

Well now hang on, if it doesn't have anything we don't already have why would it matter if it was a blank check? Which by the way it isn't, and states so very clearly in Article 51 of the Charter.

1. The provisions of this Charter are addressed to the institutions and bodies of the Union with due regard for the principle of subsidiarity and to the Member States only when they are implementing Union law. They shall therefore respect the rights, observe the principles and promote the application thereof in accordance with their respective powers.

2. This Charter does not establish any new power or task for the Community or the Union, or modify powers and tasks defined by the Treaties.

That's fairly specific I'd say.....

10. Welcome but dont im far enough.

So would you rather one step towards your goal or none?

[CookieMonster]

Did anybody mention GOODWILL?

[molloyjh]

1. Increase of power to the European Parliament

Increasing the power of the EU Parliament does not make the EU more democratic. It just means the EU Parliament is more powerful. The EU Parliament has less democratic legitimacy than the institutions (national governments and parliaments) who give up the power under Lisbon that is given to the EU Parliament with a nett loss to democracy.

Increasing the powers of the EU Parliament since 1979 has been accompanied by the growing feeling that the EU is undemocratic. Lisbon simply perpetuates a policy which is known to have failed.

If you understood the point that was being made that would have been helpful. The point is regarding the fact that the Parliament is getting an expanded role within the EU, therefore more of the EU's functions are going to be part and parcel of the Parliaments job. It is not about the EU as a whole gaining more powers, but the increased role the Parliament will have in general within the EU.

2. Permanent President of the European Council [Article 15, TEU]

The president of the EU Council has informal powers which make him the decisive figure at EU summits. He is the only person to know the negotiating position of all the heads of government (gained through the one-on-one so-called ‘confessionals’). Therefore he is the only one to know the range of possible agreements and can use this unique information to steer the EU Council towards the possible agreements he favours and away from those he personally opposes. Separating such a powerful behind-the-scenes dealmaker from the national governments creates a powerful EU figure independent of nation-states who will emerge as the most powerful politician at EU summits.

An informal position with decisive powers? Really? Do you mean to say that none of the heads of Government ever talk to each other? An surely making a figure with this sort of power an independant would be better than him/her being quite obviously biased? To be honest that whole point seems like total and utter kack.

3. The Council will meet in the open [Article 16, TEU]

No treaty is necessary for this.

It is to make it mandatory.

4. New powers of oversight for national parliaments [Article 12, TEU]

… which are toothless. Oversight is not a power. Nor 'access to information'. The only powers worth that name in law-making are the powers to propose, ammend or block and national parliaments have none of these under Lisbon. The EU Commission is free to proceed with its legislative proposals even if national parliaments object to them. Furthermore national parliaments can only object on one ground (subsidiarity). This is pure fig-leaf to disguise that national parliaments (together with the voters who elect them) are one of the main losers of Lisbon who will gradually lose their power to legislate as they are obliged to remove all national laws that conflict with any legislation enacted by the EU under Lisbon.

Yeah, you've gone on about this stuff a lot and shown yourself to be less than knowledgable about it FJ. The fact of the matter is no one states should be able to hold the EU to ransom so shouldn't have blocking powers. At the end of the day all member states agreed to join this union knowing that, while there would be drawbacks, the overall reward would be far greater. I'm not sure how you would expect a union of 27 different states to work if they all got what they all wanted all of the time.

5. More clearly defines the competences of the Union & Enshrines the principal of subsidiarity [Article 5, TEU]

Subsidiarity is not new and has never worked because the EU institutions that have been the poacher of our political powers (the ECJ and now EU Commission) get to act as gamekeeper and decide if they are taking powers they should not. They are set up as the judge of cases in which they are a party, and will not find against themselves.

Sure that's like saying that the Supreme Court here will not find against our Government. If that were the case we wouldn't be having referenda on these Treaties now would we?

6. Introduces simplified revision procedure [Article 47, TEU]

This is undesirable, giving federalists from the Commission and EU Parliament a seat in negotiations to increase their own power.

??????

This point is in relation to how, once ratified, changes are made to the Treaties. Presently it is by adding a new Treaty. Post Lisbon it would be by directly amending the existing Treaties. This would remove the Treaty referencing Treaty referencing Treaty carry on, thus making the EU as a whole more transparent in the longer term and removing the need for these complex unreadable Treaties. We still get referenda on issues impacting our Constitution. Surely this is a good thing, making things like Lisbon (one of the major gripes being how hard it is to read and understand) a thing of the past.

7. Increase the Unions foreign policy ability

The EU should not have a foreign policy, nor the ability to sign undemocratic treaties binding on all the member-states, nor for its unelected and unaccountable politicians to speak in our name in world instituions.

Why not?

8. Creates new Citizens Initiative [Article 11, TEU]

The EU Commission will use ‘citizen initiatives’ that ask for greater EU powers as PR for measures it would like to advance anyway. And it is free to ignore anything else that does not suit its instituional self-interest in 'more Europe'. This is the equivalent to petitioning a medieval king for favours.

Do you have good reason for believing this conspiracy theory? Oooooh the big bad EU is going to get us. It's going to get us and it's never going to let go. All the structural funds etc was all just to lure us into a false sense of security before they sprung their dirty trap. "Boo! Gotcha!!!!! You're all ours now....Mwahahahahaha!"

9. Charter of Fundamental Rights becomes legally binding [Article 6, TEU]

Which adds no new rights which are not already in the European Convention on Human Rights (a body independent of the EU). It does however give the ECJ jurisdiction over criminal law which will be used in the time-honoured tradition by the ‘politicians in black robes’ of the ECJ to use their judicial rulings to build an EU criminal law system that replaces national systems.

You mean the criminal law we have opt-outs on yeah? You realise that the Charter cannot serve to replace laws like that in the country that legislate for them as the agreements in the Treaties already do that yeah????

10. Energy and the Environment become greater EU competencies [Article 4 & 194, TFEU]

Environment has been an EU competence since the Treaty of Amsterdam. It has not been used to solve global environmental problems as it was claimed it would, but has been used to interfere in national issues such as the rules to be followed when collecting waste from outside people’s houses. A new EU energy policy will similarly not be used to confront the russian bear but to interfere in domestic politics, such as the building of nuclear power stations.

How could Energy and Environment policies within the EU ever be used to apply to issues outside of the EU???? That's like saying that passing a law on waste disposal in Ireland will put pressure on the US to follow suit. I think your expectations for this are a tad unrealistic.

[Freeborn John]

If you understood the point that was being made that would have been helpful. The point is regarding the fact that the Parliament is getting an expanded role within the EU, therefore more of the EU's functions are going to be part and parcel of the Parliaments job. It is not about the EU as a whole gaining more powers, but the increased role the Parliament will have in general within the EU.

Political power cannot be pulled out of a hat by a magician. If the powers of the EU Parliament are increased then those powers have to come from somewhere else. For example, giving the EU Parliament co-decision with the Council of Ministers increases the power of the EU Parliament relative to that of the national cabinet ministers. Since the cabinet ministers have a greater claim to democratic legitimacy than MEPs this results in a net loss in the democratic legitimacy of EU decision-making.

Similarly increasing the overall powers of the EU by extending the scope of its law into new policy areas increases the powers of the EU law-making chambers (EU Parliament and Council of Ministers) at the expense of national parliaments. National parliaments have the greatest democratic legitimacy of any of these political powers so again a Lisbon change which increases the power of the EU Parliament results in a net loss of democratic legitimacy.

No matter how you look at it, when Lisbon gives more powers to the EU Parliament it does so by taking them away from other more legitimate institutions resulting in the continuation of what we have seen since 1979; that the increase in powers of the EU Parliament is synonymous with the growth of the EU crisis of democratic legitimacy.