Rabble, Rabble, Rabble!

by Eanna Kelly

I am personally agitating for a ‘Yes’ vote on Lisbon and the impetus for my reason is facile: I want a single straight forward text to replace the multitudinous amount of other Treaties! There is the EEC Treaty- which is the treaty of Rome 1958 (later renamed the EC Treaty by the Maastricht Treaty 1992…..which is the Treaty on the European Union). Of course there is also the Treaty of Amsterdam 1997 and of Nice 2001 (paradoxical that any Treaty could potentially be pronounced as ‘nice’). The Single European Act 1986 and the two darlings (European Coal and Steel Community and Euratom) are also loitering around….enough! Lisbon proposes to replace these treaties and use the word ‘union’ throughout (anyone who studied EU Law would contend that the frequent interchange of words such as "community’"and "union" along with the hearty exchange of treaties is nauseatingly contrived!) My blustering philippic will cease now, (is it very obvious that I have sat a toilsome EU Law exam today...?) I just want to sit back and have someone tell me that everything will be ok and that Italy’s Barbara Matera will be sitting in the European Parliament come June…