Gormley: Being a minister doesn’t influence my yes vote
The Greens have advocated a no vote in every EU referendum since 1987, but are split on the Lisbon Treaty.
Mr Gormley, his ministerial colleague Eamon Ryan and the Green parliamentary party are supporting the treaty, but don’t have the unanimous backing of their party.
At a special convention earlier this year, the Green leadership failed to secure the required two-thirds support for a motion committing the party to support the treaty.
As a result, the party is taking no official position on Lisbon and its members are free to support either side.
It has been suggested that the leadership is supporting the treaty mainly because they are obligated to do so now that they are in government. But Mr Gormley rejected this interpretation yesterday. Asked if he would still be supporting the treaty were he not a Government minister, he replied: “Absolutely, because I worked on this treaty.”
Mr Gormley pointed out that he had been a member of the Convention for the Future of Europe, a large-scale working group which in 2002 and 2003 discussed ways forward for the EU.
The Green Party leader said that a number of the ideas he had proposed, such as the citizens’ initiative, were contained in the Lisbon Treaty.
Under the citizens’ initiative, the European Commission would be obliged to consider a proposal if one million citizens from across the member states had requested it.
Mr Gormley also said the treaty contained special provisions to protect the environment.
“Particularly when you are interested in the environment and climate change, the Lisbon Treaty is a treaty that you should vote yes to,” he said.
“I think it is very important that people understand that without EU directives in relation to the environment, our environment will be even in a worse state than it already is.”
