Former Taoiseach in plea to back EU constitution

Ireland played a huge role in the EU’s first proper Constitution and its citizens should ratify it in a referendum, it was claimed today.

Launching a guide to the new Treaty, former Taoiseach Dr Garret FitzGerald hailed Ireland’s contribution to the historic document which was brokered by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern in June during Ireland’s presidency of the EU.

Dr FitzGerald said: “We’ve made a disproportionate contribution to the Treaty and I believe it was very thoroughly negotiated.”

Dr FitzGerald said he was confident that the Irish people would ratify the Treaty in a referendum, although “nothing was certain”.

He added: “Ratification in member states like Britain, Germany and France will take a lot of work.”

Former Taoiseach John Bruton also served on the Presidium of the Convention on the Future of Europe which produced the draft Constitutional Treaty.

The new guide to the Treaty by the Institute of European Affairs (IEA) provides an in-depth analysis of the document which is due to be signed by the 25 EU heads of State on Friday.

The accord, which took four years of argument and preparation, will provide a permanent framework for the enlarged 25-member EU.

The Constitution gives national parliaments of member states a greater role in making laws and the rights of their citizens will be rigorously protected.

It also creates new roles for an executive president of the European Council and a Union Minister for Foreign Affairs.

The IEA guide was written by the Institute’s Future of Europe Group, which is chaired by Dr FitzGerald.

He said: “The only powers that the European Union will have are those conferred upon it by the governments of the member states.

“Every country in the EU, especially the smaller ones, has been accommodated adequately.”

The IEA guide traces the Treaty from its origins in the Laeken Declaration in 2001 to its final agreement by the heads of state and government of the European Union in Brussels in June.

IEA director general Alan Dukes said that the negotiation of the Treaty “has been greater, deeper and more broadly-based” than anything that has gone before.

He added: “The Constitution is a political, social and economic adventure, a calculated step into the unknown.”