BRITISH PRIME minister Gordon Brown and Conservative leader David Cameron have clashed over the nature of the “clarifications” and legal assurances given to enable the Irish Government to hold a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty.
Reporting on the outcome of last week’s EU summit in Brussels Mr Brown insisted in the House of Commons yesterday that the guarantees given to Ireland in negotiations with the EU would “clarify but not change” the treaty.
Mr Brown said the new legal guarantees in respect of taxation, neutrality and abortion, which will eventually be incorporated in a series of treaty protocols, were “specific to Ireland” and would not affect the relationships between other member states and the EU.
Mr Cameron, however, suggested the claim that the guarantees made no difference to the treaty would be received with “great interest” by the Irish people.
Resisting Mr Cameron’s renewed demand for a British referendum, Mr Brown said the new protocols would “clarify but not change either the content or the application” of the Lisbon Treaty.
However, Mr Cameron demanded to know why Irish voters were “being forced to give their views twice” while the British people had not been asked for their opinion once.
Pressing Mr Brown on why the new protocols would not be debated or put in place until the next countries join the EU, the Conservative leader charged: “Isn’t it the case the government wants to delay this until after the general election.
“They don’t want the embarrassment of having to vote yet again in the Commons to deny people the referendum they originally promised.”
Mocking Mr Brown’s promise of a new era of openness and accountability, Mr Cameron said: “In the last week you’ve tried to sneak through a secret inquiry into Iraq, deny the British people a say on the European constitution, and avoid a debate in parliament on these new protocols agreed in Brussels.
“If you really believe in openness and accountability, shouldn’t you start now by holding a debate now on the protocols, offering people the referendum on the constitution you promised. And while you’re about it, why not do a proper U-turn on the Iraq inquiry right here, right now?”
Mr Brown said the Irish people had sought clarifications about the impact of the Lisbon Treaty.
“They have their clarifications. It will be set out in a protocol. It will come to all Houses of Parliament, at the next accession treaty, when that has to be confirmed by these [Westminster] houses of parliament. That is the right thing to do.”
Czech president Vaclav Klaus will wait for all European Union countries to ratify the Lisbon Treaty and for a domestic court ruling before he signs the charter himself, he said yesterday.
The charter has been approved in the Czech Republic by both houses of the parliament and only Mr Klaus’s signature is needed to complete the ratification process.
“I will surely not rush with my signature, I need to wait until all the things that I have talked about and which include a constitutional complaint . . . happen,” Mr Klaus said in an interview for Czech radio Radiozurnal.