Britain kicks off plan for EU vote

British prime minister David Cameron kicked off his plan for a changed relationship with the EU, admitting he will not get treaty change before he has to put his in/out referendum to the people.

He wants to avoid a situation whereby Ireland and other countries would have to hold a referendum in case any of them rejected whatever deal Britain manages to conclude with the EU over the coming months.

Instead, Mr Cameron said, they will try to agree protocols as Ireland did, and that could be added to the treaty when next it is changed.

Dara Murphy, the European affairs minister, emphasised that a lot of what Britain wants is in line with Ireland’s wishes, but warned that London could not take too much for granted.

“We want Britain to stay but we will not accept unrealistic proposals from them, but we have not heard any concrete suggestions from them yet,” he said .

While the issue was just a footnote in the draft conclusions of a two-day meeting of European leaders in Brussels, and Mr Cameron did not spend long talking on the issue, it was the launch of a process that is expected to last for the next year or more.

The European Commission has set up a group to work with British representatives to explore what changes they want and if they are feasible, politically and legally.

British man Jonathan Faull, head of the internal market and services at the commission, has been given the job of chairing the group.

Ireland has also set up a working group that will feed into any discussions in Brussels.

Apart from wanting to ensure that EU workers coming to Britain would have to wait longer to collect benefits, Mr Cameron wants to be exempt from the EU ambition for “an ever closer union”.

Mr Murphy said many of the British demands, with which Ireland would agree, on reducing red tape and making the EU more business friendly, was already happening under the Juncker commission that took office in October.

A senior British source said there was no agenda for the commission/British taskforce.

“There is a serious set of issues to go through, it will be a tortuous process.

“The commission won’t set the agenda — our asks will be our asks,” the source said.