EU states agree to follow draft constitution closely

THE EU member states have agreed to stick closely to the draft European constitution drawn up over the past 18 months.

However, Ireland has parted ways with most of the other smaller EU member states it formed an alliance with while working on the document.

Foreign Minister Brian Cowen said Ireland is happy with the way the Italian presidency has decided to deal with the constitution while several of the other smaller countries are uniting to battle for changes.

“We do not want to see it unravelled. The Italian presidency has come up with a good assessment of what needs to be done.

“There is no element missing from that and we do not feel ourselves precluded from the areas that we are concerned about,” he said.

The two areas of major concern to the Irish Government have been singled out by the Italians as requiring approval by either heads of government or foreign ministers over the next few months.

These are the issues of ensuring that the EU will be absolutely excluded from having any say in a country’s taxation policies and that the proposed EU foreign minister will not also chair the External Relations Council of national foreign ministers.

Ireland has parted company with most of the 17 other smaller states on the issue of every commissioner having a vote.

“We are more interested in ensuring that there is equality and that the same conditions will apply to all member states,” a Government spokesperson said.

However, commission President Romano Prodi told the ministers the idea of junior commissioners with no vote will not work.

“To work well it needs equal rights for the commissioners.”

The most surprising issue to come to the fore during the Italians’ meetings with national governments over the summer is that of whether there should be a reference to Christian values in the preamble of the constitution.

One of Ireland’s representatives on the convention responsible for the constitution, former Taoiseach John Bruton, signed a letter calling for such a reference.

However, he said he would not pursue it if it proved to be divisive.

The Irish Government is likely to wait and see what the consensus is among the member states.

“The issue is not fundamental to the working of the union but we need to find something that we can all live with,” said one diplomat.

“The debate reflects the differences between those states that maintain a difference between the working of Church and State and those others who want a closer identification.”

Poland in particular has been pushing for the reference to Christian values while others believe such a reference would exclude non-Christians. The Italians, who will chair the nine meetings planned to finalise the constitution from October to December, say the document should be ready before the European Parliament elections next June.