The fortunes of the Government must be disentangled from any new vote on Lisbon, writes NOEL WHELAN
COMMENTS BY Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin earlier this week suggest that the Government is seriously considering telling the December European Council that Ireland will hold a second Lisbon referendum, probably in October of next year.
His comments came as last weekend's TNS/mrbi poll in The Irish Timesindicated that, if Ireland could retain its permanent commission place and secure reassuring declarations on issues such as taxation and abortion, there would be a slim Yes majority.
The changes reflected in the opinion poll were only slight, however, and well within the margin of error. The Government still needs to be very cautious before deciding to put the Lisbon question to the electorate a second time.
The holding of another Lisbon referendum and the possibility of a different result will be determined not by amendments to the content of the treaty itself but by the changed context in which such a second referendum takes places.
It is actually only 23 weeks since the first Lisbon referendum but in that relatively short time this country has experienced a political and economic transformation.
The economic deterioration is likely to be the most significant factor in a second Lisbon referendum. We are now in deep economic recession and perhaps on the brink of an even more precarious global economic collapse. Voters may be beginning to appreciate that this is not the time to gamble with key international relationships.
The movements towards the Yes side revealed in the TNS/mrbi poll, such as they were, occurred among those demographic groups most sensitive to economic influences.
The second significant difference is that for any second referendum there will be greater clarity about what the other member states would do if Ireland doesn't ratify the treaty.
Those who predicted that a No vote would force a general renegotiation of the treaty have been shown to be wrong. Having spent almost a decade putting the Lisbon proposal together, Europe's leaders are not going to reopen the treaty provisions.
While the treaty cannot be ratified without Ireland's consent, the other members states can develop mechanisms to move forward without Ireland if necessary.
They will have to continue to work the current EU decision-making system involving Ireland but we cannot stop them simultaneously regrouping in another legal format to operate Lisbon-like structures from which Ireland would be excluded.
In deciding whether a second referendum is possible the Government will also have to factor in the collapse of its own political standing since last June.
Even if, while overhauling the banking system and implementing further severe public spending cuts, the Government manages to restore some of its standing, its capacity to influence a referendum outcome next October will be limited.
The main Opposition parties may continue to benefit politically from the changing economic circumstances but they will not be able to, or really want to, expend their newly enhanced political capital on a Yes campaign.
If the Lisbon referendum is to be passed next time, it will have to be fought for by non-government and indeed non-political players.
Too much of the money and effort expended on the Yes campaign last spring was spent on promoting individual political candidates and parties rather than making the case in favour of the treaty. The only way to avoid a recurrence of this is to ask those who want to financially support the Yes campaign to do so in ways other than by contributing to the political parties.
If a second referendum is to have any prospect of success, there will have to emerge a non-political entity on the Yes side which proves to be as well-organised and as well resourced as Libertas.
Last spring too many voters and some Opposition politicians saw the referendum as an opportunity to give the Government a bloody nose and too many sectional interests cynically exploited the campaign to leverage concessions from the Government.
Next time around the cause of ratification needs to be disentangled from the fortunes of the Government
The political parties will be a key component of any second Yes campaign and they will need to be more co-ordinated in their approach. However, in term of media and marketing the primary branding around a Yes argument will have to be non-political.
The appeal for Yes in a second referendum will have to come loudest from organisations and personalities other than the main political parties.
The most important thing the Government itself could do is to change the knowledge environment in which another referendum would be held. Before even naming a referendum date, the Government should put time, effort and money into laying down a layer of knowledge about the treaty's provisions.
I argued here last January that the Government should send each household a copy of the consolidated European Union treaties illustrating the changes which the treaty would make.
The need for such an initiative is now even greater. Only a small percentage will actually read it but making it available will dispel voter suspicions that something is being slipped by them. It would also enable voters to check the competing claims of both sides against the actual text.
If the Government is going to take the constitutionally controversial step of putting the same question in a referendum again, they should do the electorate the courtesy of showing them what they are being asked to vote on.