By Catherine Moore
Young people in Ireland explain why they have rejected the Lisbon Treaty.
According to EU statistics, young people are the mot euro skeptic of all, with over 69% voting no to the Lisbon Treaty. European Union membership has benefited Ireland since it first joined in 1973. These include economic benefits and improvement to infrastructure. Young people can freely move between Member States to study or work and students benefit from grants. Yet, young people, according to the way they voted for Lisbon, are anti-Europe. Graham Daly is a master’s student, who believes that the strong no vote among young people was due to lack of information.
“Too little information [was] given to [the] public and the published official leaflet was not informative, nor gaged to the "ordinary" reader who wants quick-fire information, instead of long text,” he said.
However, he thinks that this was done on purpose by the government in order to get a yes vote. “[The]…Government…they tend to swoop things upon us with the aim that we’ll confusingly say yes,” he said.
Ciara Ni Nuallain, a European Studies graduate said that she voted no on many grounds including a fear of losing of neutrality, a concern that Ireland would lose loosing its voice with it by not having a Commissioner for five out of every 15 years, fear of the number of Irish Members of Parliament being capped and a fear of a loss of Ireland’s sovereignty and identity: “There are many reasons why I voted no, and due to no change in the treaty, I will continue to vote no. However I think the yes campaign will have their day as the government will use scare tactics pertaining to our economy to entice people to vote yes,” she added.
Helena Ryan, a young professional is angry about the re-hashing of the EU Treaty as the Lisbon Treaty. She feels that the no vote was ignored and the government will keep re-hashing the treaty until it is voted in. “The government will keep holding the election until people eventually vote yes. Why did they bother letting people vote for it so,” she said.
The resounding opinion among those that were interviewed was that of fear. There is a fear of this new globalised world that we live in, and young people in Ireland fear Europeanisation. Lack of information about the treaty has only helped to contribute to young people’s fear. The booklets that the government circulated were not read by the young people interviewed. They found them too long winded and did not research the treaty any further.