More than 70% of 'No' voters thought a second treaty would be negotiated.

PopeBuckfastXVI

VoidStarNull wrote: »

We're probably going off topic here, but what the hell...

+1

I'm all out of 'thanks', can't believe I used my last one on a No voter, hope you're enjoying it ShooterSF

Morgans

PopeBuckfastXVI wrote: »

Given the possible downsides though, and the chance that this 'likely outcome' won't happen, it's a bit of a game of Russian Roulette though.

These 'concessions' are things that were already in the treaty and in Nice, just restated in clearer English.

That is fair enough, but even that would be a victory - removing ambiguity from the treaty would have helped enormously, and stopped the No side from engaging in scaremongering.

But again the Yes side are very pointedly saying that there is no renegotiation but then thinking the likely outcome - which might not happen - is an effective renegotiation/clarification.

DublinWriter

SkepticOne wrote: »

Because the country as a whole is fundamentally eurosceptic.

I wouldn't say that, the majority of us have always been happy with being in the EU.

I think the reason the majority of people voted no was because as a nation we're pretty ticked off with our politicians and the way things are going in general with health and transport infrastructures.

So it followed that when our elected betters asked us to vote 'Yes' we voted 'No' as a protest vote more in relation to what was going on at home than in Europe.

SkepticOne

DublinWriter wrote: »

I wouldn't say that, the majority of us have always been happy with being in the EU.

I think the reason the majority of people voted no was because as a nation we're pretty ticked off with our politicians and the way things are going in general with health and transport infrastructures.

So it followed that when our elected betters asked us to vote 'Yes' we voted 'No' as a protest vote more in relation to what was going on at home than in Europe.

When I say eurosceptic I mean there is little enthusiasm for any sort of "European Project". I'm not sure there's much enthusiasm in other countries either, but you will at least find public figures willing to talk about the ultimate purpose of Europe, it's destination.

Do we have figures like Giscard D'Estaing networking behind the scenes promoting, not his vision of France and it's place in Europe, but his vision of Europe itself?

Boggle

I wouldn't say that, the majority of us have always been happy with being in the EU.

There's a difference in being part of the EU and being effectively ruled by the EU which is clearly the end game here.

nesf

Boggle wrote: »

There's a difference in being part of the EU and being effectively ruled by the EU which is clearly the end game here.

Some want that, I'm not sure if they are a big enough group to push it through though.

Boggle

Some want that, I'm not sure if they are a big enough group to push it through though.

And I would have counted myself in that group as I thought that a larger, more professional parliament would be less prone to dumb policies than our own. Unfortunately I now think that bigger governments just need bigger bribes and that maybe its better to have some chance of ousting a bad leader than no chance...

Does that make any kind of sense at all??

Rented Mule

Was I under the misunderstanding that all Member States would have to ratify this document or it would be 'dead in the water' ?

There was no 'Plan B' for Europe is the talk that I heard.

Now all of a sudden they are pushing it through in other Member States and there is talk of a Tier Two Europe in the making ?

The confusion post-election Lisbon Treaty seems to be alot greater than before.

ixtlan

Rented Mule wrote: »

Was I under the misunderstanding that all Member States would have to ratify this document or it would be 'dead in the water' ?

There was no 'Plan B' for Europe is the talk that I heard.

Now all of a sudden they are pushing it through in other Member States and there is talk of a Tier Two Europe in the making ?

The confusion post-election Lisbon Treaty seems to be alot greater than before.

Obviously there was no plan B, and the yes side said that. Why should anyone be surprised at the confusion.

Lisbon is dead in the water. There is a possibility that with added guarantees or small changes we can vote again. However I'd expect that no politician in Ireland would go near that unless opinion polls were showing a big big swing to the yes side.

Regarding ratification it continued after the constitution treaty failed in France for 18 months.

As for the 2-tier Europe, certainly we can block any attempts to create this, but we have to ask the question whether that is in our interest, to be the no man of Europe. The Ian Paisley if you will. It's not unreasonable for the others states to say "fine you don't want Lisbon, but we do, release us to do as we wish". That however is not going to happen without another referendum. If that vote goes no too though you can expect plan B to be ready and waiting.

Ix

hmmm

Rented Mule wrote: »

Was I under the misunderstanding that all Member States would have to ratify this document or it would be 'dead in the water' ?

There was no 'Plan B' for Europe is the talk that I heard.

Now all of a sudden they are pushing it through in other Member States and there is talk of a Tier Two Europe in the making ?

It's fairly simple. Yes Lisbon is dead if one country blocks it.

The EU can do a couple of things
1) Carry on with the ratifications and hope Ireland changes its mind - what they're doing now
2) The other 26 countries can ratify a similar treaty amongst themselves - the 2 tier Europe

We have the right to block Lisbon. We do not have the power to block whatever 26 other countries want to do on their own. The "no" side seems to have peddled this notion that the status quo was on offer if we voted no, it wasn't.

lostexpectation

the entire article is usual indo bumpkin

http://dublinopinion.com/2008/06/17/the-irish-independent-and-the-non-existent-european-commission-report/

SkepticOne

hmmm wrote: »

2) The other 26 countries can ratify a similar treaty amongst themselves - the 2 tier Europe

I'm very interested in this idea. It has been repeated many times but no one seems to know how it might work. It seems to me that these other countries that might ratify a treaty among themselves will still be governed by a commission operating under the Nice framework. Any 'similar' treaty changing the way the EU institutions work will still require Ireland's ratification. I stand to be corrected here, of course.

Can you put some flesh on this idea you have? I can see that, say, Germany, France and Holland might agree to cooperate on, say, scientific research in a particular area, for example, but I don't think that is what people are getting at here.

hmmm

SkepticOne wrote: »

Can you put some flesh on this idea you have? I can see that, say, Germany, France and Holland might agree to cooperate on, say, scientific research in a particular area, for example, but I don't think that is what people are getting at here.

I'm not an expert and I don't know if anyone really knows how to pull it off, but I'm sure it's manageable. There is little to stop a group of countries getting together multilaterally to agree on even some fundamental issues of sovereignty, e.g. the creation of the Euro. As you mentioned there is also few issues with bilateral arrangements.

Where it gets more tricky is institutional change. Here I could see the other 26 countries renaming the Lisbon treaty and ratifying it in their parliaments. They could then ask the Irish government not to veto the revised multilateral treaty under something like enhanced co-operation. I could see Ireland being involved in some meetings but not in others e.g. asked to leave the room when discussion of EU foreign policy takes place. We will have a veto on pretty much everything, but do we really want to be the Ian Paisley of Europe as someone mentioned here earlier by using that veto.

I don't think we'll ever get to that and the prospect of Ireland being "thrown out" is unthinkable, but I'm sure the core Euro countries do not have infinite patience and will wish to move on.

marco_polo

lostexpectation wrote: »

the entire article is usual indo bumpkin

http://dublinopinion.com/2008/06/17/the-irish-independent-and-the-non-existent-european-commission-report/

In fairness it is not impossible that someone could have leaked some of the the preliminary finding to a newspaper is it?

Especially as an article in the Irish Times reported pretty much the same thing too albeit different aspects of it.

lostexpectation

well the indo could have been upfront about it.

rte a reporting it now with direct quotes from the european commision can anyone find the poll.

should it be here

http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/index_en.htm

lostexpectation

http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11579372

A telephone poll of 2,000 people organised by the European Commission found a majority of men voting yes, but a majority of women no. Young people under 29 voted against Lisbon by two to one. In other words, a 19th-century-style electoral roll, restricted to older, male property-owners, would have produced a handsome yes for Lisbon. But would that have been more democratic?

lostexpectation

RD notices the confusion over the poll aswell

http://www.richarddelevan.com/2008/06/19/poll-why-ireland-voted-no/

still don't see it on their site!! i hate org who gives things to the media and don't make it the available on their site.

Crash

So you hate companies that publish information through well defined media outlets, but OMFG ITS NOT ON TEH INTERNET YET?

Jaysus. I think I prefer the days of finding news out in the paper first. People were less needy and demanding.

Hitman Actual

In fairness, in the Times article, they did say they were preliminary findings:

Irish Times wrote:

according to the preliminary findings of the poll of 2,000 voters taken at the weekend.

And:

Irish Times wrote:

A more comprehensive analysis of the results will probably be published by the commission later this week.

So I don't think they're trying to pull the wool over anyones eyes.

lostexpectation

SkepticOne wrote: »

]

crash_000 wrote: »

So you hate companies that publish information through well defined media outlets, but OMFG ITS NOT ON TEH INTERNET YET?

Jaysus. I think I prefer the days of finding news out in the paper first. People were less needy and demanding.

getting the complete numbers rather then select quotes from various newspapers, i would find that pretty damned important.

WooPeeA

Of course there won't be new negotiations! Who will spend another 2 years on negotiating the same.. And then maybe Ireland will say NO again..? No chance.

PHB

Some stuff can be changed, some stuff can't. For example, they can't force through the Lisbon Treaty version of the commissioner ruling through the open method of cooperation, but they can force through Energy policy.

That said, they can suspend our voting rights if we don't agreed to the reduced form of the commissioner as we agreed to in Nice.

nesf

lostexpectation wrote: »

getting the complete numbers rather then select quotes from various newspapers, i would find that pretty damned important.

Some more detail on the numbers for you: http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/index_en.htm (It's the top one there)

The EU has released the preliminary survey figures.

Hitman Actual

nesf wrote: »

Some more detail on the numbers for you: http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/flash/fl_245_en.pdf

The EU has released the preliminary survey figures.

404 Not Found. ???? Bad link, nesf.

nesf

lenny_leonard wrote: »

404 Not Found. ???? Bad link, nesf.

Just tried again there, they seem to have removed it for some reason. Odd.

axer

Does the fact not remain that Lisbon IS dead if Ireland do not ratify?

If Lisbon dies then of course something else will be negotiated just like the constitution was re-negotiated into Lisbon. Whats shocking about 70% of no voters thinking that?

Hitman Actual

axer wrote: »

Does the fact not remain that Lisbon IS dead if Ireland do not ratify?

If Lisbon dies then of course something else will be negotiated just like the constitution was re-negotiated into Lisbon. Whats shocking about 70% of no voters thinking that?

Yes, but considering that the general public seem to have very little idea of how the EU works, do you really think people were basing their opinion of possible negotiation on what happened with the constitution? The general public thought there would be renegotiation mostly because Sinn Fein and Libertas said there would be.

melekalikimaka

lostexpectation wrote: »

http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11579372

A telephone poll of 2,000 people organised by the European Commission found a majority of men voting yes, but a majority of women no. Young people under 29 voted against Lisbon by two to one. In other words, a 19th-century-style electoral roll, restricted to older, male property-owners, would have produced a handsome yes for Lisbon. But would that have been more democratic?

to generalise...i stress generalise, these sorts usually have the most knowledge on the topic, i'd rather the vote given to them then every tom dick and harry with a vote, making uneducationed decisions on our country bases on their fears and not facts

marco_polo

Bit off topic but here is a detailed analysis of the French Referendum on the Constitution, if anyone has time to spare.

http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/flash/fl171_en.pdf


Mostly concerns about the economy and immigration lead to the original constitution getting rejected. An intresting read and if the Irish equivilant is half as informative then it will be an important document.

nesf

Preliminary analysis of the Irish Referendum is up again: http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/flash/fl_245_en.pdf

Edit:

From a brief glance at it, some interesting points:

a) Massive age bias between the camps.

b) No rural/urban divide in voters, proportions were similar on both sides.

c) Manual labourers voted No but the unemployed were equally split (interesting?).

d) Large problems in identifying what actually was at stake with this treaty towards the end, there were a lot of issues that weren't really on the table that came up for both the Yes and No camps.


Interesting reading imho.