Bantry fishermen don’t need Bulgaria to help run their industry

OUR political elite seem dumbfounded at the no vote and offer patronising explanations.

What they have failed to grasp is that the public now realise that EU treaties are unequal.

They always involve a transfer of power from the people to the elite who become ever more unaccountable.

It is self-evident that the people of many EU states feel likewise, and it is this message which Mr Cowen must deliver.

Thus the Lisbon Treaty does not contain specific policies, but it does provide the mechanism by which repugnant laws will be imposed on the people of Ireland without their consent. The treaty erodes the power of the people and enhances the power of the elite to pursue their own agenda. The Irish fisheries minister (say) can strut about the stage of Europe. He is happy to concede control of fishing in Bantry in return for influence over fishing in Bulgaria.

His self-importance is inflated by the fact that his utterances will receive rapt attention from Aberdeen to the Azores.

But the people of Bantry don’t care tuppence about the fishing in Bulgaria and they are perfectly capable of organising the fishing in Bantry Bay without the assistance of the Bulgarian government.

Furthermore, should they feel the need to open fire on the politician responsible for a serious crisis in their industry, they have no desire to travel any further than Dublin to do it.

Mr Cowen must now transform his humiliation into heroism. Instead of being called before the EU summit as a naughty schoolboy to receive insults directed at the Irish people, he must now turn the tables and say to the other leaders of Europe: “You go and win referendums in your own countries, and I’ll guarantee afterwards to resubmit the treaty to my people.”

Bill Bailey

Kilcascan Castle

Ballineen

Co Cork