The Government is set to postpone indefinitely Ireland's referendum on the EU Constitution after the European Summit decided in Brussels last night that the ratification process should be put on hold.
European Union leaders agreed to abandon the deadline of November 2006 for ratifying the constitution but said it was up to each member-state to decide when to proceed with ratification.
Luxembourg's prime minister, Jean-Claude Juncker, whose country holds the EU Presidency, said that countries planning to hold referendums would need more time to persuade voters of the constitution's virtues. He said the EU needed a period of "reflection, explanation and debate".
Mr Juncker said that EU leaders agreed that those countries that had not yet ratified the constitution.would be unlikely to do so by mid-2007, and it was now up to each individual member state to decide how to proceed while a "period of reflection" was launched.
The summit's failure to impose a mandatory freeze on ratification means that the Government must decide when Ireland should hold a referendum.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern said that the constitution remained the best choice for Europe and for Ireland but that the pause should be of "a sufficient period in order to try and convince some sceptical people".
Most leaders wanted the suspension of the ratification process to apply to all member-states, although Malta, which has started ratification, argued that each country should decide for itself how to proceed.
Mr Ahern said that the Taoiseach had argued that EU leaders should describe the suspension of ratification efforts as a "pause for engagement" rather than a "pause for reflection" as it has been described in advance of the summit.
"The Taoiseach led the charge arguing that it should be a period of engagement, a period of selling what we all believe in as a project, and that was picked up by a lot of people," he said.
The Taoiseach referred back to Ireland's "No" vote in the first referendum on the Nice Treaty. According to Dermot Ahern he told them "how we tried to engage with civil society, particularly through the Forum for Europe" and how this had led to a Yes vote in the second referendum.
Ireland, he said, had had a period of engagement with the people, rather than one of reflection, and this was how the rest of Europe should respond to the anti-Treaty sentiment in many EU member states.
He said it had been broadly accepted among the 25 EU heads of state and government that because of the No votes "there is uncertainty in other countries, including our own. To rush into a referendum [ in] the atmosphere of indecision would be injudicious", he said.
Mr Juncker said that ratification of the constitution would proceed and that there was no Plan B but a "Plan D for dialogue and democracy".
EU leaders played down hopes of an agreement today on the EU's next seven-year budget plan, amid disagreements over the future of Britain's rebate, which returns to London two-thirds of its contribution to the EU budget.
Luxembourg's EU Presidency has proposed a freeze to Britain's rebate at its current level of about €4.6 billion for the next seven years, with any further change contingent on a reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Under the presidency proposal, CAP spending would be fixed until 2013 but €6 billion of the cost of subsidising farmers in Romania and Bulgaria would have to come out of the budget earmarked for the current 25 member-states.
The Government wants the €6 billion for Romania and Bulgaria to come out of other budget funds but officials accept that Ireland will face a drastic cut in regional funds in the next budget period. Government sources predict that Ireland will become a net contributor to the EU budget towards the end of the decade.
The French president, Jacques Chirac, called for a special summit to discuss issues facing Europe, including the admission of new member-states. The EU is due to start accession talks with Turkey later this year and Romania and Bulgaria are due to join in 2007.