Oil giants think Lisbon treaty is good for them

IN her letter (March 31), Senator Deirdre de Búrca suggests the European energy innovation fund proposed by Libertas and welcomed by EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs, who called it a good and timely proposal, is in some way inconsistent with our opposition to the Lisbon Treaty.

That is simply not the case.

If ratified, the treaty would hand decision-making in Europe over to the democratically unaccountable policymakers and the lobbyists who seek to influence them in their decisions.

That is why Europe’s biggest oil and gas conglomerates — which can buy the best lobbyists — support the Lisbon treaty.

They know it means business as usual, or better, because it removes the threat of serious innovation and competition to these conglomerates — Sarkozy’s “national champions”.

The provisions of the Lisbon treaty regarding energy are aspirational and meaningless without the genuine democratic accountability which would give proper legitimacy to the increased powers being handed to Brussels.

The real path to ensuring a clean, efficient and secure energy supply for Europe does not lie with the regulations of an unelected elite in Brussels, swayed by lobbyists’ weasel words, but rather by true entrepreneurial spirit such as that which provided the engines in Europe for the Renaissance and the industrial revolution.

Furthermore, the Lisbon treaty provides a pathetic five words on the issue of climate change, thereby demolishing any genuine environmentalist’s claim that it is good for Europe’s environment.

Let’s be clear, this treaty is not about reform of energy, the environment or combating climate change. It is a treaty of the bureaucrats, by the bureaucrats for the bureaucrats.

Declan Ganley

Chairman

Libertas

Moyne Park

Tuam

Co Galway