Introducing the Treaty of Lisbon

Introducing the Treaty of Lisbon

The latest EU treaty, the Treaty of Lisbon was signed by Gordon Brown and leaders of 26 other EU states on 13 December 2007. It replaces the rejected European Constitution, but contains all the key elements of the Constitution. It is a raw egg turned into a scrambled egg, but it is still the same egg.

What will the Treaty of Lisbon (previously called the Reform Treaty) do? The most important thing is that it will take the members states of the EU towards "ever closer union" and towards the ultimate goal of a single European state. This is the aim repeated in every EU treaty.

Gordon Brown talks particularly about British "red lines" – points on which the UK has made no concessions. These are said to guarantee that justice and home affairs (the right to frame our own laws, have trial by jury etc) will continue for ever in British control. Yes, EU leaders have agreed that the UK can have an opt-out in these areas, but any British prime minister may, at any time, simply announce that "we have decided to give up our opt-out arrangements" and it will all come under EU control.
Giving up UK control in this way would not be for the first time in EU history. John Major negotiated an opt-out from the "social chapter" in the Treaty of Maastricht. He obtained a cast-iron guarantee that the UK could stay outside the EU system. But in 1997 Tony Blair simply announced that we were opting into the social chapter and the guarantee fell away for ever.
This government has already tried to abandon trial by jury for certain cases. It is keen to adopt the EU system of identity cards and be involved with a twenty-seven-country database containing data on every EU citizen, the Schengen Information System. This suggests that sooner, rather than later, we may see the guaranteed protection from EU control disappear in this area of policy.
In Foreign Affairs there appears to be no immediate transfer of power that would be brought about by this treaty, but the EU has recently set up its own Foreign Office with its armies of investigators and advisors. The voice of our own Foreign Office will inevitably be weakened. Eventually, as the EU achieves its declared aim of the complete union of the states of Europe the little "local" foreign offices in member states will be closed down. Power will pass to this fledgling organisation which at this stage looks quite insignificant.
The treaty creates a new EU Foreign Minister, though he will be given a fancy title to camouflage his role. In time his powers will increase at the expense of member states until he speaks for all EU states.

EU leaders are terrified that the new treaty would be rejected by many EU states if they allowed their electorates a say, and that is why they are opposed to holding referendums and listening to the voice of the people. French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, said in Strasbourg on 14 November, "France was just ahead of all the other countries in voting no. It would happen in all member states if they had a referendum. There is a cleavage between people and governments."
That sums it up precisely. EU leaders have met in secret like conspirators. They have not issued completed texts of the final documents for the public to see and consider, even though this transfer of sovereignty is of fundamental importance to every European. They know that Europeans will not accept something that has not been properly presented to them, and yet they are determined to go against the known wishes of the people of Europe.

This is a betrayal of trust and undemocratic in an area of utmost importance - the area of British sovereignty, who runs this country. Sovereignty rests with the people. It is for the people to decide who we will permit to govern us and what form of government we shall have.

I am convinced that EU leaders have a policy of trying to make it difficult for ordinary citizens to follow what they are doing. One technique is to have several different names for one thing. This is especially true of treaties. The latest EU treaty is a good example. By changing the name every four weeks only those who are paying close attention know what EU leaders are talking about.
From 2003 to June 2007 the Treaty existed in a form that was known generally as The EU Constitution. In June 2007 it was agreed that this should be re-written and the word "constitution" would not be used. Leaders started talking about "an IGC mandate for the Reform Treaty." Soon they were talking about the Reform Treaty. For a while they talked about the Treaty amending the Treaty amending the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty Establishing the European Community.
On 13 December 2007 all 27 EU leaders signed what was described as The Treaty of Lisbon. On 17 December the final text was published with the title, "Treaty of Lisbon amending the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty Establishing the European Community."
Could they have been more unhelpful? Of course, this is not the final change of name in this series. The Treaty of Lisbon itself changes the name of the Treaty Establishing the European Community to "Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union".
To add to the confusion the EU practices frequent re-numbering of articles. Much of The Treaty of Lisbon is devoted to re-numbering articles. Can it get worse? Yes it can. The Treaty of Lisbon does not have articles, but a numbered list of amendments. Unfortunately the numbering is not continuous. It runs from 1 to 61, then at that point without a heading or even a subheading the treaty switches from dealing with the Treaty on European Union to dealing with the Treaty Establishing the European Community, the numbering starts again at 1 and runs to 295. Then there are "Final Provisions" articles 1-7 followed by 12 Protocols which are not numbered and two more which are numbered 1 and 2. The treaty finishes with 65 numbered Declarations. There is no contents page! This chaotic approach makes everyone's ability to refer to specific items and so discuss them very difficult.
When Gordon Brown addressed the UK parliament on the subject of this new treaty he did not use either of the titles known to the general public. Instead he simply referred to "this amending treaty".
Why all these changes? The Constitution was rejected by France and Holland in referendums. To get the Constitution accepted there had to be changes. The open honest approach would have been to make changes to the Constitution. That way everyone would be able to see what had been done.
The Constitution, it must be remembered, was created by joining together the provisions of two earlier treaties: The Treaty on European Union and the Treaty Establishing the European Community. (They have other names but let's try to keep the story simple.) It also added new bits which are generally called "innovations".
The plan adopted by Angela Merkel as President of the European Union, was to keep the innovations of the Constitution, but rather than have one coherent document  they would have the whole thing taken to pieces and re-assembled by placing the innovations in the original two treaties. This was a deliberate plan with two purposes. (a) To keep the innovations.
                     (b) To confuse EU citizens and so avoid referendums on the basis that they were simply keeping two existing treaties with "amendments." In fact these amendments (The Treaty of Lisbon) amounts to 271 pages. No minor matter.
Where is the evidence for points (a) and (b)? See EU leaders spill the beans.

For more detail on this subject see The Treaty of Lisbon - Key Facts. For even more detail read my book, The European Union and You.