Tearing up the Irish Constitution

[Sam Lord]

A good letter in the IT today examining the implications of the exact wording of the referendum that the Irish people are being asked to pass.

To my layman’s understanding, this clause is stating that the Irish Constitution is to be set aside when it comes to government activities conducted under the auspices of the fiscal treaty and is therefore effectively asking the Irish citizenry to suspend its own Constitution and the rule of law for any and all activities issuing from ratification of the treaty.

Besides looking like eerily like another (more famous) “Enabling Act” also passed in conditions of crisis, this proposal appears also to deprive the Irish citizenry of any and all constitutional protections should they conflict with laws, acts and measures implemented by the government as a result of the treaty.

http://www.irishtimes.com/letters/in...#1224316805222

[C. Flower]

A good letter in the IT today examining the implications of the exact wording of the referendum that the Irish people are being asked to pass.
http://www.irishtimes.com/letters/in...#1224316805222

Jesus wept. I certainly see the Fiscal Treaty and the ESM as a form of political coup, but I had read this paragraph without grasping the implications -

The referendum is asking us to support or oppose the addition of the following subsection to Article 29.4 of the Constitution: “The State may ratify the Treaty on Stability, Co-ordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union done at Brussels on the 2nd day of March 2012. No provision of this Constitution invalidates laws enacted, acts done or measures adopted by the State that are necessitated by the obligations of the State under that Treaty or prevents laws enacted, acts done or measures adopted by bodies competent under that Treaty from having the force of law in the State.”

Both our Government, or the Treaty bodies, could pass laws that are otherwise unconstitutional in Ireland, and enforce them.

[Sam Lord]

For information purposes: The "Enabling Act" refered to in the letter is the one passed in Germany in 1933 giving the Cabinet the authority to pass laws without reference to the Parliament.

[Seán Ryan]

Article 32

1. To enable the ESM to fulfil its purpose, the legal status and the privileges and immunities set
out in this Article shall be accorded to the ESM in the territory of each ESM Member. The ESM
shall endeavour to obtain recognition of its legal status and of its privileges and immunities in other
territories in which it performs functions or holds assets.

2. The ESM shall have full legal personality; it shall have full legal capacity to:
(a) acquire and dispose of movable and immovable property;
(b) contract;
(c) be a party to legal proceedings; and
(d) enter into a headquarter agreement and/or protocols as necessary for ensuring that its legal
status and its privileges and immunities are recognised and enforced.

3. The ESM, its property, funding and assets, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall
enjoy immunity from every form of judicial process except to the extent that the ESM expressly
waives its immunity for the purpose of any proceedings or by the terms of any contract, including
the documentation of the funding instruments.

4. The property, funding and assets of the ESM shall, wherever located and by whomsoever
held, be immune from search, requisition, confiscation, expropriation or any other form of seizure,
taking or foreclosure by executive, judicial, administrative or legislative action.

5. The archives of the ESM and all documents belonging to the ESM or held by it, shall
be inviolable.

TREATY ESTABLISHING THE EUROPEAN STABILITY MECHANISM

We won't even be having a referendum on this one. The constitution was torn up long ago...

[DCon]

This group of 11 will have their way. Irish Referenda be damned

The German-led push, supported by 11 of 27 EU countries, embraces recent calls in Berlin and Brussels for a directly elected European president, sweeping new powers for the European parliament, and further splitting of the EU by creating a new parliamentary sub-chamber for the 17 countries of the eurozone.

While the call for a European army was not supported by all 11, the document also calls for a new European police organisation to guard the union's external borders and for a single European visa.

Nine months of brainstorming over the future of Europe by the foreign ministers of the 11 countries, launched by Guido Westerwelle, the German foreign minister, has resulted in a 12-page document crammed with policy recommendations. It will prove hugely contentious and, if implemented, will increase the pressure on Britain to quit the EU.

"To make the EU into a real actor on the global scene we believe that we should in the long term introduce more majority decisions in the common foreign and security policy sphere, or at least prevent one single member state from being able to obstruct initiatives," the document said.

The backers include Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Poland, five of the six biggest EU countries omitting Britain. The Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Portugal and Luxembourg also signed up.

Apart from stiff resistance from Britain, which would veto a European army and refuse to take part in foreign policies with which it disagreed, the proposals are likely to prompt a turf war in the European commission because they would strip several departments of powers and resources, concentrating them in the EU's relatively new diplomatic service headed by Catherine Ashton, a Briton.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012...olicy-overhaul