The Lisbon treaty - Vote yes for Europe — and Ireland

THE MAJORITY of Irish people have been a la carte Catholics for several decades and it seems we are perilously close to becoming a la carte Europeans.

Just as we became selective about Catholicism because of the shameless hypocrisy and the litany of sexual abuse once hidden or ignored by the Catholic hierarchy, we seem to be contemplating a future as diminished, part-time Europeans because we no longer trust or respect all of those who advocate a yes vote. We are, it seems, heading for a photo finish in a tight race because so many of us no longer trust our politicians.

Before Mr Ahern’s leadership ended, virtually every member of the cabinet stood before us defending the indefensible. They assured us we were lucky to be led by a great statesman. That pitiful delusion now exacts its price as the credibility of those who supported it struggle to convince a sceptical electorate to vote yes.

Just as Mr Ahern’s I-won-it-on-the-horses testimony is greeted with hilarity Brian Cowen’s campaigning for a yes vote is met by a deficit in respect. He backed the wrong horse for too long and is paying the price.

That Mr Cowen is absolutely right to argue for a yes vote, and that so much depends on the treaty being ratified, only makes the irony all the more tragic.

If the Lisbon campaign reminds arrogant politicians that our consent may not be taken for granted, that we will not be patronised and that we do want high standards in high places, it will have been worthwhile.

However, it would be wrong to vote no just to make that domestic point.

There have been many arguments made against ratification. Some of them hysterical — those on abortion and euthanasia for instance — and others just plain wrong. We have been willfully misled by the no campaign on neutrality and our representation within European institutions. We will have a commissioner, but under a different arrangement that applies equally to all member states.

Other arguments, however, are a cause for concern — the democratic deficit especially — and must be confronted no matter how tomorrow’s referendum goes.

There are deep and growing concerns, though largely unspoken, about the impact immigration is having on work prospects for Irish people. Yesterday’s startling unemployment figures will only fan those flames. Some may imagine a no vote is a vote against immigration.

The no campaign have demanded that we turn to an imagined Plan B and reopen negotiations to “get a better deal”. They hope our European co-citizens, all 26 nationalities, would react positively and start the whole tortuous cycle again just because we, all of 1% of the EU population, want changes.

This suggestion might sound plausible in a junior cycle civics class if the Lisbon treaty did not already represent Plan B.

If you consider the realpolitik you will realise that we will be immediately marginalised and soon afterwards possibly irrelevant.

Those countries who aspire to our level of affluence, achieved through tremendously generous EU supports, will wonder why we are so ungrateful and pursue their own Celtic Tiger dreams as if we never existed. They will prosper, possibly at our expense.

As ambitious countries move to grasp the great opportunities EU membership offers we should look back to see what unity has achieved for Europe and for Ireland. It has brought peace and prosperity to a continent twice destroyed by great wars in the last century and where, until the end of the cold war just 20 years ago, two great batteries of nuclear missiles faced each other across the Iron Curtain. Europe’s sense of unity and purpose now makes the prospect of such confrontations all but unimaginable.

In our case it turned an insular, impoverished, unsure and stagnated backwater into one of the richest countries in the world. If you can’t imagine what living in a backwater is like, ask your mother. It was that recent and the change has been that profound.

Now the entity that facilitated that bloodless revolution needs to change the rules, so it can do its business more efficiently. Remember, that business is allowing nations to come together, by their own choice, to form a union of states and of peoples for the benefit of all.

It is a condition of membership that member states be committed to liberty, democracy, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and the rule of law. What’s not to like? In a fast-changing world we have no future outside of Europe, so we should, despite our misgivings, do all we can to be at the very centre of the project.

Vote yes for Lisbon, vote yes for Europe and, most especially, vote yes for Ireland.