A GROUP campaigning for a No vote in the October 2nd referendum on the Lisbon Treaty has expressed concern over guidelines issued to broadcasters that remove any requirement for them to give equal airtime to the Yes and No sides in the debate.
Vote No to Lisbon, formerly the Campaign Against the EU Constitution, opened its campaign in Dublin yesterday.
Speaking at the press conference, Socialist Party MEP Joe Higgins said there were just six weeks and three days to go in the campaign and that a lot of time was needed to clarify the issues.
He said nothing had changed in the Lisbon Treaty since the referendum in June last year, but a “fresh debate” was needed.
Mr Higgins said the treaty was a “profoundly undemocratic” document that enshrined “as the norm the running of essential public services for profit, including health and education”.
In its campaign statement, the group said the electorate was being “threatened, cajoled and lied to” in relation to the treaty.
It claimed the guarantees secured by the Government in relation to issues such as abortion and neutrality did not alter the treaty in any way, and that the electorate was being asked to vote on exactly the same document it rejected in the June 2008 referendum.
Mr Higgins said he was also “very concerned” at how the debate would be conducted in the media.
He said guidelines issued to broadcasters by the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI) indicating they did not have to allocate 50:50 airtime to the Yes and No sides were “extremely sinister”.
Mr Higgins said the guidance that “only fairness need apply” would be “interpreted, of course, as a big majority of the Yes side being given a greater weight than those in the opposition, despite the fact that, as of now, we represent a big majority of the Irish people, while the political establishment and the big business establishments which are backing Lisbon represent . . . a minority view”.
Mr Higgins said the No campaigners would watch the debate “very carefully” and would “insist that the division of representation is absolutely fair, which means on a 50:50 ”. “We will engage with anybody on the Yes side, but we want to do it on a level playing field and with equal time and equal ability to engage.”
In its guidelines, the BCI said broadcasters that choose to cover the referendum should ensure “fairness, objectivity and impartiality in the exposure given to referendum interests on all its features and programmes”. It said there was “no requirement to allocate an absolute equality of airtime to opposing sides during coverage of the referendum”.
Chairman of Independent Broadcasters of Ireland Willie O’Reilly said this month the guidelines recognised “in a formal way that being fair to all sides does not necessarily represent a 50 per cent division of airtime”.
Mr Higgins was joined by Sinn Féin vice-president and former MEP Mary Lou McDonald and People Before Profit councillor Bríd Smith. Other affiliated groups include the Peace and Neutrality Alliance, the Irish Republican Socialist Party, Irish Friends of Palestine Against Lisbon and socialist republican group Éirigí.