Why I’m Voting No.

Opinion | 30th May 2012

I have always been a passionate believer that the European projects exists primarily for the benefit of its citizens. I have supported some EU treaties in the past, and opposed others like the Maastricht Treaty.

Tomorrow I will be voting no to the Fiscal Stability Treaty, and I do so because the way in which this treaty has been negotiated, and the economic philosophy underpinning it, to my mind are completely at variance with the original goals of the Union: an inclusive union of equals, exisiting to advance the common good of the peoples of its member states. That’s the Europe of Robert Schuman.

From what I can see, the lopsided intergovernmental approach at the European Council table has in this instance worked against that great common good. It has encouraged more discord amongst the people of Europe, and placed the interests of large banks at best on a par with those of European citizens.

The heart of my concern about this treaty is that when we nationalised the bank debt we effectively made it impossible for our country to adhere to the rules set out in the treaty, regardless of whether we ratify it or not we simply cannot afford to stick to the rules being set out unless we get a significant write-down of that debt. A yes vote will mean that the country will sign a contract it knows it will break – and insert that contract into our constition. That is not in the interests of Ireland or the European Union. Yes – we must balance our national accounts and service our legitimately acquired debt, and we must do that to a specific timeframe, but not at the rate enforced by this treaty and not because it’s in our constitution.

The treaty also in no way addresses the origins of this crisis – unsupervised lending by large banks in the UK, Germany and France and reckless borrowing  by Irish ones.

I have respect for many people on the yes side, and I understand that the Government’s task is not easy. I recognise the motivation of many of those on the yes side is to achieve what  they think is in the best interests of our country. But equally, my decision to vote no comes from a similar place of conviction. I know that the Treaty is not the best solution for Ireland or Europe; to my mind it seems that events (Spain, Greece) will overtake us and inevitabley force the hand of all the actors here, even Angela Merkel, and we will end up considering what has up to now been the non-negotiable – debt mutualisation and an unlimited guarantee on the Eurozone’s survival from the ECB. Four years ago we could never have imagined where the economic crisis would end up taking us. This hallmark of this crisis has been exactly that – the unthinkable becoming commonplace.

My no vote is cast certain in the belief that this Treaty is absolutely the wrong solution to this crisis, and that those last ‘unthinkables’ must again become commonplace if we’re to, at last, find that solution.

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Posted by admin on May 30, 2012. Filed under EU Issues,International Issues,National Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry