Lisbon Treaty from a LGBT perspestive?

Marshy

The whole issue of us not retaining the commisioner was ridiculous last time out. Not only was that arranged under Nice but ultimately the commisioner doesn't serve Irish interests (or isn't supposed to anyway) but is just an Irish representative. Most people didn't seem to grasp that.

Stark

Indeed I think Lisbon II is a step backwards in this regard. Having 27 commissioners means you pretty much have to make up roles for people and it means Ireland has a higher chance of ending up with some crappy "junior commissioner" role. Not to mention adding bloat to an institution that needs to be more efficient. With Lisbon I, you had 18 commission positions being rotated on a fair basis (every country gets 2 out of 3 years regardless of it size) between the member states. But I guess a full time commissioner for every country is what the people want.

FutureTaoiseach

Vote no. Since Spain voted yes unemployment doubled to 18%. In the year up to April, Irish exports rose 5%, compared to falls of 29% in Germany and 9% in the UK. Also, Eurostat (EU statistics office) says that Irish industrial output in April-June 2009 rose 9.3%, compared to a drop of 0.6% in the Eurozone. Lisbon is actually a threat to Irish jobs because of the race to the bottom and mass-immigration. Article 6 (TEU) as amended by Lisbon states that the Charter of Fundamental Rights will have "the same legal value as the Treaties", meaning that the ECJ will interpret it. Article 15(1) of the COFR states that everyone has the right to work. This will force us to legalise employment for asylum-seekers. Because the UK has an optout from it, that would leave Ireland and Malta the only English-speaking countries to allow asylum-seekers to work. That would lead to tens of thousands of asylum-seekers currently resident in Britain coming to Ireland, competing for work against the 600,000 Irish unemployed. This would lead to higher Irish unemployment. Furthermore, Article 19(1) of the Charter bans "collective expulsions". This will be used in the ECJ to challenge deportations for example of asylum-seekers who have children here or who brought them to Ireland. In effect then, we would be recreating the baby-tourism whereby having children here would mean immunity from deportations. With a deficit of €21 billion, we can no longer afford spending €350 million per annum on asylum. Lawyers want Lisbon because the Charter will allow them to profit even more from asylum appeals with yet another layer of appeals - this time in the ECJ. Vote NO.

UK Europe Minister Baroness Kinnock (wife of former Labour leader Neil Kinnock) has told the House of Lords that they will not have the force of EU law until added as a Protocol to a future Accession Treaty. She said: "Those guarantees do not change the Lisbon treaty; the European Council conclusions are very clear on them. The Lisbon treaty, as debated and decided by our Parliament, will not be changed and, on the basis of these guarantees, Ireland will proceed to have a second referendum in October." She added: "Nothing in the treaty will change and nothing in the guarantees will change the treaty as your Lordships agreed it....My Lords, what we have in the guarantees will become binding in international law when the guarantees are translated into a protocol at the time of the next accession, which presumably will be when Croatia or Iceland comes in. Before that protocol can be ratified by the UK, Parliament must pass a Bill. As I said, Parliament will rightly have the final say." But UK Foreign Secretary David Milliband appeared to contradict her during questions at the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee stating: "Every head of state agrees that these guarantees do not change the Treaty...the guarantees are legally-binding in international law... It does not require ratification in order to have legal affect." This lead the Chairman of the Committee to ask, "If this is a legally-binding decision and doesn't need ratification, why does it need to be put in a protocol?" He asked, "Is it a stitch-up to get around Irish peoples' concerns? I can see why people would be suspicious." To confuse things further, Liberal Democrat MEP and self-described "militant federalist" Andrew Duff has claimed that an Irish Protocol appended to an Accession Treaty would be challenged in the courts as it would violate EU law, saying: "Adding this protocol to the Croatian accession treaty would leave the treaty wide open to attack in the courts...".According to the Irish Times, "he added that rules in the EU treaties governing accession treaties only allow issues pertaining to a state's accession to be dealt with." Clearly, the credibility of the Government's 'guarantee's is not something they can take for granted. I, for one, am far from convinced of their veracity.

Stark

FutureTaoiseach wrote:

Vote no. Since Spain voted yes unemployment doubled to 18%.

But the treaty was never ratified and is therefore irrelevant to Spain's predicament. We managed to **** things up for ourselves without voting yes.

FutureTaoiseach wrote:

In the year up to April, Irish exports rose 5%, compared to falls of 29% in Germany and 9% in the UK. Also, Eurostat (EU statistics office) says that Irish industrial output in April-June 2009 rose 9.3%, compared to a drop of 0.6% in the Eurozone.

Hmm, I wonder who we exported to?

FutureTaoiseach wrote:

Article 6 (TEU) as amended by Lisbon states that the Charter of Fundamental Rights will have "the same legal value as the Treaties", meaning that the ECJ will interpret it. Article 15(1) of the COFR states that everyone has the right to work. This will force us to legalise employment for asylum-seekers. Because the UK has an optout from it, that would leave Ireland and Malta the only English-speaking countries to allow asylum-seekers to work. That would lead to tens of thousands of asylum-seekers currently resident in Britain coming to Ireland, competing for work against the 600,000 Irish unemployed. This would lead to higher Irish unemployment. Furthermore, Article 19(1) of the Charter bans "collective expulsions". This will be used in the ECJ to challenge deportations for example of asylum-seekers who have children here or who brought them to Ireland. In effect then, we would be recreating the baby-tourism whereby having children here would mean immunity from deportations. With a deficit of €21 billion, we can no longer afford spending €350 million per annum on asylum. Lawyers want Lisbon because the Charter will allow them to profit even more from asylum appeals with yet another layer of appeals - this time in the ECJ. Vote NO.

We have the same opt outs that the UK has. We didn't use them at the height of the boom in the cases of Poland and Latvia as we needed the plentiful supply of labour. We are using them in the cases of Romania and Bulgaria.

Boston

FutureTaoiseach wrote: »

Vote no. Since Spain voted yes unemployment doubled to 18%. In the year up to April, Irish exports rose 5%, compared to falls of 29% in Germany and 9% in the UK. Also, Eurostat (EU statistics office) says that Irish industrial output in April-June 2009 rose 9.3%, compared to a drop of 0.6% in the Eurozone. Lisbon is actually a threat to Irish jobs because of the race to the bottom and mass-immigration. Article 6 (TEU) as amended by Lisbon states that the Charter of Fundamental Rights will have "the same legal value as the Treaties", meaning that the ECJ will interpret it. Article 15(1) of the COFR states that everyone has the right to work. This will force us to legalise employment for asylum-seekers. Because the UK has an optout from it, that would leave Ireland and Malta the only English-speaking countries to allow asylum-seekers to work. That would lead to tens of thousands of asylum-seekers currently resident in Britain coming to Ireland, competing for work against the 600,000 Irish unemployed. This would lead to higher Irish unemployment. Furthermore, Article 19(1) of the Charter bans "collective expulsions". This will be used in the ECJ to challenge deportations for example of asylum-seekers who have children here or who brought them to Ireland. In effect then, we would be recreating the baby-tourism whereby having children here would mean immunity from deportations. With a deficit of €21 billion, we can no longer afford spending €350 million per annum on asylum. Lawyers want Lisbon because the Charter will allow them to profit even more from asylum appeals with yet another layer of appeals - this time in the ECJ. Vote NO.

UK Europe Minister Baroness Kinnock (wife of former Labour leader Neil Kinnock) has told the House of Lords that they will not have the force of EU law until added as a Protocol to a future Accession Treaty. She said: "Those guarantees do not change the Lisbon treaty; the European Council conclusions are very clear on them. The Lisbon treaty, as debated and decided by our Parliament, will not be changed and, on the basis of these guarantees, Ireland will proceed to have a second referendum in October." She added: "Nothing in the treaty will change and nothing in the guarantees will change the treaty as your Lordships agreed it....My Lords, what we have in the guarantees will become binding in international law when the guarantees are translated into a protocol at the time of the next accession, which presumably will be when Croatia or Iceland comes in. Before that protocol can be ratified by the UK, Parliament must pass a Bill. As I said, Parliament will rightly have the final say." But UK Foreign Secretary David Milliband appeared to contradict her during questions at the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee stating: "Every head of state agrees that these guarantees do not change the Treaty...the guarantees are legally-binding in international law... It does not require ratification in order to have legal affect." This lead the Chairman of the Committee to ask, "If this is a legally-binding decision and doesn't need ratification, why does it need to be put in a protocol?" He asked, "Is it a stitch-up to get around Irish peoples' concerns? I can see why people would be suspicious." To confuse things further, Liberal Democrat MEP and self-described "militant federalist" Andrew Duff has claimed that an Irish Protocol appended to an Accession Treaty would be challenged in the courts as it would violate EU law, saying: "Adding this protocol to the Croatian accession treaty would leave the treaty wide open to attack in the courts...".According to the Irish Times, "he added that rules in the EU treaties governing accession treaties only allow issues pertaining to a state's accession to be dealt with." Clearly, the credibility of the Government's 'guarantee's is not something they can take for granted. I, for one, am far from convinced of their veracity.

And what has this to do with LGBT issues? Why should be vote no from an LGBT perspective.

Stark

Locking the thread as it's long gone off the topic.

The European union forum is this way: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=1069 for anyone who wants to discuss general aspects to the treaty.