Joe Higgins opposes Lisbon based on HIS own lies

Martin 2

Martin 2 wrote: »

Joe Higgins will be on KFM (Kildare FM) http://www.kfmradio.com/ in the next few minutes. They should announce a text number for questions as well.

The show opened and closed with the allegation of deliberate falsification of the text of article 52 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights on his website. He said this was a textual error and doesn't change the central message of how the Treaty might affect the operation of the Charter. At the end of the show he said that the allegation was a monstrous Stalinist distortion.
-Talked more about worker's rights.
-Mentions contractors exploiting migrant workers, mentions Laval, Viking and Luxembourg.
-Complains about Ryanair and Intel's advocation of a Yes vote.
-Admits Irish neutrality won't be affected by the treaty but says it would increase militarisation in Europe
-Dismisses Coir poster, stating that the minimum wage after Lisbon could be 1.84 euro, as a distraction from the real issues

Joycey

PopeBuckfastXVI wrote: »

So you want a Europe united around the interests of the normal working people, but you don't want those normal working people to have the ability to move around and work, or 'import their labour', where they please in your 'United' Europe?

Martin 2 wrote:

-Mentions contractors exploiting migrant workers, mentions Laval, Viking and Luxembourg

...

PopeBuckfastXVI

Joycey wrote: »

...

I'm still not sure... do you believe in the free movement of labour or not?

BlitzKrieg

On laval

the Lavel ruling and a number of other such rulings have to do with weaknesses in the existing 1996 Posting of Workers directive, which now has to be revised. Those who are making these claims ignore the fact that the ETUC sees the Lisbon Treaty as very much part of the solution to the problems raised by some recent ECJ rulings, with the binding Charter of Fundamental Rights, the restated values and objectives, the binding social clause, and the provison enabling the EU to accede to the European Convention on Human Rights.

As I believe was said somewhere else, if the laval case was run under Lisbon, the result was quite likely to have been different.

Scofflaw

rowlandbrowner wrote: »

The Socialist Party weren't even in existence for the first 3 votes on that chart, why does it have them listed as voting No.

Because they were previously Militant Tendency in the Labour Party, and opposed the treaties listed.

Whats your point? The fact that the SP among others on the left have maintained their position that they are not against a united Europe in and of itself, but merely the centralisation of power in the capitalist establishment in Europe who work only to serve a certain elite of incredibly wealthy business interests in each country, is not something to simply brush aside. Whether you agree with the central argument or not is irrelevant, they are not simply voting no as a result of reactionary or xenophobic tendencies, so a comparison with COIR is rediculous.

Neither are they simply resorting to scare tactics as are the various Yes campaigners at the moment, insinuating that Ireland will no longer "belong" to Europe should we reject the treaty, or resorting, as Cowen did on the news the other day, to what is essentially blackmail, saying that we dont want to piss off the capitalist establishment in Europe - the ECB - for fear that our credit will dry up. Those are scare tactics, the equivalent of the sh1te that Ganley was propagating the last time round. While the SP made a regrettable error in posting misinformation on Higgin's site, you can hardly claim that they are waging their campaign entirely based on a contentless appeal to populist fears, as I would argue the Yes side are.

The funny thing is that despite the opposition of the Irish Socialists to every EU treaty, labour conditions here are almost infinitely better than they were when we joined - and that progress isn't the result of progressive Irish governments fighting a lone battle against a regressive Europe.

So frankly the narrative you're putting forward is extremely unconvincing, and you're pretty lucky that's the case, because if the Socialists had managed to convince the Irish electorate to vote No to all the EU treaties they've opposed, we'd still be stuck in the dark ages of labour legislation.

cordially,
Scofflaw

rowlandbrowner

Scofflaw wrote: »

So frankly the narrative you're putting forward is extremely unconvincing, and you're pretty lucky that's the case, because if the Socialists had managed to convince the Irish electorate to vote No to all the EU treaties they've opposed, we'd still be stuck in the dark ages of labour legislation.

not if they convinced the electorate to vote them into government, however improbable it may be the goal of the Socialist Party is to presumably be in government and with that in mind their voting record makes sense. One Example: I’m sure a Joe Higgins led national government would oppose private medical companies operating in Ireland, EU policies favour them and Lisbon actualy renders the national government unable to close the door on them by removing the WTO veto, makes sense that they would vote No to lisbon and past treaties.

Stark

PopeBuckfastXVI wrote: »

I used to think he was honest, if mistaken, in his policies.

But then I saw the two false claims he made about Lisbon:

1. It meant privatisation of healthcare and education
2. It was a 'self-amending' treaty, requiring no future referenda

I realised he's either too stupid to understand the treaty, or he understands the treaty perfectly fine and is happy to lie to the Irish people about it.

He's either incompetent or dishonest and either way I wouldn't trust him any more than I'd trust a 3 card monte dealer.

This latest incident just confirms my opinion of him.

On the self amending Treaty argument, I asked someone what they meant by this and they quoted the following article on Lisbon:

Article 48 TEU

The government of any Member State or the Commission may submit to the Council proposals for the amendment of the Treaties on which the Union is founded. If the Council, after consulting the European Parliament and, where appropriate, the Commission, delivers an opinion in favour of calling a conference of representatives of the governments of the Member States, the conference shall be convened by the President of the Council for the purpose of determining by common accord the amendments to be made to those Treaties. The European Central Bank shall also be consulted in the case of institutional changes in the monetary area. The amendments shall enter into force after being ratified by all the Member States in accordance with their respective constitutional requirements.”

It's the exact same wording as in Nice:

Article 48 TEU Nice

The government of any Member State or the Commission may submit to the Council proposals for the amendment of the Treaties on which the Union is founded. If the Council, after consulting the European Parliament and, where appropriate, the Commission, delivers an opinion in favour of calling a conference of representatives of the governments of the Member States, the conference shall be convened by the President of the Council for the purpose of determining by common accord the amendments to be made to those Treaties. The European Central Bank shall also be consulted in the case of institutional changes in the monetary area. The amendments shall enter into force after being ratified by all the Member States in accordance with their respective constitutional requirements.”

All it means is that member states are allowed negotiate a new treaty, but that the treaty must be put through a ratification process according to a member state's constitutional requirement. ie: a referendum in Ireland.

ilovelamp2000

There's one thing I find funny about the attack on Joe Higgins being discussed on Boards.

If anyone adopted the approach the attackers did while arguing a topic on this forum they'd be banned for trolling.

FutureTaoiseach

He's not a liar. The problem is there are different versions of this Charter - one from the EU Constitution period and a slightly modified one for the Lisbon period. I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that this was a clerical error. However, I agree with his underlying argument on the Charter, because of the Viking judgement, where the Charter was cited by the ECJ, in terms of the limitations that can be imposed on workers-rights. That is certainly the view of the European Trade Union Institute:

ETUI wrote:

The shipping line Viking runs ferry services between Finland and Estonia under the Finnish flag. The company’s management decided to re-flag their ferries - using the Estonian flag. The decision was also taken to employ Estonian labour in order to take advantage of the fact that wages are lower in Estonia. In response, the Finnish Seamen’s Union (FSU) warned the company Viking that they might take collective action to stop the re-flagging process. To avoid the danger of being undercut, it also asked the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) under its “Flag of conveniences campaign” to ask their members not to start negotiations with Viking unless they were based in Finland. According to this campaign, the ITF affiliates agreed that only trade unions established in the state of beneficial ownership should have the right to conclude collective agreements covering the vessel concerned. The ECJ recognised the right to take collective action, including the right to strike as a fundamental right which forms an integral part of the general principles of Community law. Nevertheless, this right might be restricted, as reaffirmed by Article 28 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union which states that it is to be protected in accordance with Community law and national law and practices. Furthermore the exercise of this right may be subject to certain restrictions. In the Laval and Viking cases the ECJ states that national employment law comes inside the scope of Community’s free movement legislation. This means that no special treatment is applied in the employment law sphere. The judges go even further when they consider that the freedoms can be invoked against trade unions (this is called: horizontal direct effect), meaning that employers can now take trade unions to court, to get a judgement on the legality of a collective action.
The ECJ sees the right of trade unions to take collective action as a restriction on the freedom to provide services or the freedom of establishment. Collective action must be justified. It must have a legitimate aim, respond to overriding reasons of public interest and be suitable for securing the attainment of the objective pursued and not go beyond what is necessary in order to attain it. Those conditions are often called the proportionality test, which is now introduced by the court with respect to the trade union rights...

PopeBuckfastXVI

FutureTaoiseach wrote: »

He's not a liar. The problem is there are different versions of this Charter - one from the EU Constitution period and a slightly modified one for the Lisbon period. I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that this was a clerical error.

One that resulted in him interpreting the article the way this 'clerical error' rendered it?

How many other 'clerical errors' inform his opinions?

marco_polo

Rosco1982 wrote: »

There's one thing I find funny about the attack on Joe Higgins being discussed on Boards.

If anyone adopted the approach the attackers did while arguing a topic on this forum they'd be banned for trolling.

If it was a simple mistake of taking the wrong text from somewhere on one occasion, then why did he also use the changed meaning that this gave the article on numerous occasions while debating?

Stark

Ah yes, the "oops, that was actually the EU constitution I was talking about" clerical error. Funny how that one crops up a lot.

Scofflaw

rowlandbrowner wrote: »

not if they convinced the electorate to vote them into government, however improbable it may be the goal of the Socialist Party is to presumably be in government and with that in mind their voting record makes sense. One Example: I’m sure a Joe Higgins led national government would oppose private medical companies operating in Ireland, EU policies favour them and Lisbon actualy renders the national government unable to close the door on them by removing the WTO veto, makes sense that they would vote No to lisbon and past treaties.

That's kind of a bizarre statement. Presuming that you mean by "private medical companies" companies like VHI, I have no idea why you think it has anything to do with either the EU, the WTO, or Lisbon. The EU has a very limited role in health - support only, and Lisbon has a specific restriction on such action which is stronger than the one in Nice:

7. Union action shall respect the responsibilities of the Member States for the definition of their health policy and for the organisation and delivery of health services and medical care. The responsibilities of the Member States shall include the management of health services and medical care and the allocation of the resources assigned to them.

Nor, of course, does your point address the issue that if we'd voted No to all the treaties the Socialist Party wanted us to vote No to, we'd have missed out on most of the progressive social legislation of the last twenty years.

Really, the SP is just playing "lefter than thou" to the gallery.

cordially,
Scofflaw

meglome

rowlandbrowner wrote: »

not if they convinced the electorate to vote them into government, however improbable it may be the goal of the Socialist Party is to presumably be in government and with that in mind their voting record makes sense. One Example: I’m sure a Joe Higgins led national government would oppose private medical companies operating in Ireland, EU policies favour them and Lisbon actualy renders the national government unable to close the door on them by removing the WTO veto, makes sense that they would vote No to lisbon and past treaties.

The reality is they didn't get into power but have still objected to the EU at ever turn. The same EU which has brought forward nearly all of our workers rights legislation. What is it, do the EU make them look bad or something? I'm sorry but the vast majority of what the EU has done has been great for Ireland and that makes me very suspicious of people who refuse to support that, ever.

Liam Byrne

Well, I read the "official" leaflet that arrived in the door here, and I'm not convinced that Higgins is the only one lying or being confusing/evasive with the truth!!

Page 3 : Council of Ministers

From 2014, a qualified majority would require that a) 55% of the member states agree; b) those member states supporting the decision must represent 65% of the population. A decision cannot be blocked by fewer than four member states, no matter how large their population

Page 7 : Taxation

Ireland's policies on direct taxation cannot be changed by the EU unless there is unanimous agreement on the Council of Ministers. Ireland therefore has the power to veto any such change and the Lisbon Treaty does not change this.

So does Page 7 (a paragraph) over-rule the explicit "proposed changes" from Page 3 ?

If so, why doesn't Page 3 mention "excluding key areas of interest to Ireland such as taxation" ?

Given the shambles that "our own" shower have made of the country, I'd almost prefer to be ruled completely from Brussels, so I'd be edging towards voting "yes"; but the feeling of being conned by this Government plus the arrogance of their "keep voting until you do as we say" attitude is making me think twice.

I mean, if we vote "yes", will we have another referendum in case people change their minds again ? Or does this only apply when we don't agree with those "in power" ?


P.S. We should also give Higgins a break; it appears that he's read BOTH treaties, unlike Cowen & Lenihan.

PopeBuckfastXVI

Qualified Majority Voting rules only apply to areas where Qualified Majority Voting applies (strangely enough!!), and taxation is not one of those areas.

Does this answer your question? If not I'll need more detail from 'page 3' as I don't have the leaflet in front of me.

marco_polo

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Well, I read the "official" leaflet that arrived in the door here, and I'm not convinced that Higgins is the only one lying or being confusing/evasive with the truth!!

Page 3 : Council of Ministers



Page 7 : Taxation



So does Page 7 (a paragraph) over-rule the explicit "proposed changes" from Page 3 ?

If so, why doesn't Page 3 mention "excluding key areas of interest to Ireland such as taxation" ?

Given the shambles that "our own" shower have made of the country, I'd almost prefer to be ruled completely from Brussels, so I'd be edging towards voting "yes"; but the feeling of being conned by this Government plus the arrogance of their "keep voting until you do as we say" attitude is making me think twice.

I mean, if we vote "yes", will we have another referendum in case people change their minds again ? Or does this only apply when we don't agree with those "in power" ?

In some areas such as Taxation, Foreign Policy and Defence decisions are made by unaminity, in others areas such as the internal market they are made by QMV via the ordinary legislative proceedure so there is no conflict between the two statements.

As our constitution stands only the Governement may call referenda.