Catherine Reilly's blog

The Catastrophe. That's what they'll call it. The term's inappropriateness won't matter because, in their minds, that's exactly what it'll be. Make no mistake, as each calendar day replaces the next, Europe and Ireland's political elite, the masterminds of Lisbon 1 and 2, are slowly spreading their ink-tarred fingers over their eyeballs, peaking out if they dare.

If I were them, I'd probably not look either, because the nightmare situation - that Ireland's recession-beaten public will use a Lisbon No as a battering ram to force out their 'inept' Government - is potentially unfolding.

So Ireland’s Lisbon 2 will soon be upon us, and one wonders whether the sequel lives up (or down) to the original. Are the mysterious characters, confusing plotline and cliff-hanger ending of the first instalment about to make a reappearance?

Catherine Reilly is deputy editor of Metro Eireann, Ireland’s multicultural weekly

Methinks not, for a variety of reasons. Firstly, one of the unexpected stars of Lisbon 1 has exited stage left. Libertas founder Declan Ganley –a mysterious Ango-Irish multi-millionnaire with financial interests in the US military – will not be gracing the arena, following his defeat in the European Parliament election in Ireland’s North West constituency - and Libertas’ poor showing Europe-wide.

Variously described as an ego-inflated moneybags, a well-meaning reformist or a financially-motivated shadowy sort, Ganley was the charismatic focal point of last year’s ‘No’ efforts. He was a bolt from the blue, a good speaker who well-articulated people’s fears and distrust of Eurocrats, but his fall from grace has been as dramatic as his rise. It’s presently unclear to me why Libertas is capitulating in Ireland. Ganley is not short of a buck, and while his European Parliament election failure was embarrassing, it was hardly a curtain call. Perhaps he senses that, this time around, he’ll be on a hiding to nothing.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Eireann): So the Lisbon Treaty will be put to the Irish public again, but are our faces bovvered?

In an everyday context, news that Ireland must vote again on a sweetened-up treaty would be a major talking point, with aggressively-contested radio phone-ins and copious media coverage, as we again prepared to bask in Europe’s spotlight.

But everyday contexts have  been made redundant. The economic situation is rapidly deteriorating and the Government is spooked. Lisbon talk is limp, and even the release of precise information on the potential detail of Lisbon Two may not enliven debates to expected levels.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Éireann): Who really runs 'democratic' countries, government officials or politicians? I have often wondered.

Last week, a long-time Irish politician raised that very question, in response to news reports in Ireland that there may be another referendum on the Lisbon Treaty.

You can read the rest of Catherine Reilly's coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty here, here, here,here, here, here, here, here, here and here

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Éireann): Yes, you may have noticed, I haven’t been around for a while. The truth is, I couldn’t handle much more Lisbon Treaty talk. It was, to use a popular expression here, ‘wrecking my head’.

Even before the vote took place, a well-liked comedy programme on Ireland’s national radio station did a skit in which a ‘reporter’ visited a newly established ‘mental institution’ in the west of the country. The institution had opened to cater for people ‘driven crazy’ by the Lisbon Treaty (the treaty itself, and the constant arguments about it). Their screams seemed so real.

And they haven’t stopped. The deluge of national and indeed international press coverage on Ireland’s No has been constant since the result began to emerge (a fortnight-lifetime ago). It has subsided slightly on the national front, now that Ireland looks to be in its first recession since the mid-80s. National newspapers are leading with RECESSION headlines in bold black ink, but some people are wondering if we are actually talking ourselves into one. Is there such a thing as a psychiatrist who treats whole countries? Because Ireland really needs some therapy right now - some ‘me’ time, while it soaks in a relaxing, hot radox bath surrounded by scented candles. Or maybe people think we’ve had too much of that?

Catherine Reilly continues her coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. You can read the rest of the series here, here,here, here, here, here, here and here.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Éireann): Let me preface this post by saying that I am notorious for my predictions – a sad fact that I neglected to mention in my previous entry. From high-profile murder trials to important and not-so-important football matches, I make the wrong call time and time again (though I did correctly predict a fall in Ireland’s house prices some time ago – golden star for me, misery for thousands of homeowners).

Anyway, to labour the point, I’m not a betting woman, unlike our former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern.

Now it looks like I’ve completely called it wrong again when I predicted in yesterday’s entry that Ireland’s undecided voters would vote Yes. It seems that being told what to do, in relation to something you don’t understand, just hasn’t washed with Ireland’s voting public (or the half that bothered to vote). This became clear last night at the voting booths, which saw a late surge in my locality, and was further apparent during Mark Mardell’s unintentionally amusing report from Dublin during last night’s BBC One news. He said one woman told him that she had still not made up her mind as she stood at the voting booth, her pencil ‘hovering over the ballot paper’. Another person told Mardell they ‘hadn’t got a clue’ what the treaty was all about. Fair play to Mardell, he caught the mood superbly during his unintentionally hilarious report.

Catherine Reilly continues her coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. You can read the rest of the series here,here, here, here, here, here and here.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Éireann):Tonight, before 10pm, I’ll venture out to my old primary school to cast my vote in the Lisbon Treaty referendum. On the outside, the school looks quite similar to when I departed its gates in the early 1990s. Inside, though, the infrastructure has improved considerably. I sometimes wonder what old photos of us kids in the mid-80s - with our scruffy hairstyles and somewhat tattered appearances - must seem like to the kids at that north county Dublin school today. Unrecognisable, I’d say. Indeed, by the time I left the school system itself in 1999 - when whiteboards with fancy markers were beginning to replace their chalk-choked predecessors -the past was quickly becoming unrecognisable to me, too. ‘You’re so lucky,’ I vividly recall our Irish language teacher telling us as 17-year-olds. ‘You will grow up with the Celtic Tiger.’

Catherine Reilly continues her coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. You can read the rest of the series here, here, here, here, here and here.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Éireann): For Brian Cowen, Ireland’s new prime minister (Taoiseach), the Lisbon Treaty is probably starting to seem much less like a referendum, and more like a chilling midnight horror movie in which you are the first victim. Young buck has world at his feet; has some vague notion of impending doom, though can’t quite put his finger on why; cut to happy suburban scenes, with birds chirping merrily in the background, and then BHAM!

What happened next? No one knows yet - the moviemakers are keeping it a closely guarded secret, and rest assured, there are no ‘spoilers’ on the internet chat-rooms.

Today I asked my mother which way she’d vote in the Lisbon Treaty - had she made up her mind? She’s an intelligent woman, and reads the newspapers (any at all, bar The Irish Times) every evening after a hard day’s nursing at a Dublin hospital. Last night, she watched RTÉ’s Question and Answers (almost identical in format to BBC’s Question Time), which was dedicated in full to the Lisbon Treaty. She was impressed by Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald MEP, a No advocate, but as the conversation pingponged between McDonald, the audience, the presenter, and the Yes side (the latter represented by Foreign Affairs Minister Micheál Martin TD, and Enda Kenny TD, leader of Fine Gael), confusion set in. A confusion of the ‘He said that you said - no I never said that’ variety. A sentence that’s even confusing in itself. Apt.

Catherine Reilly continues her coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. You can read the rest of the series here, here, here, here and here.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Éireann): Ireland’s farmers have been encouraged to vote ‘Yes to Lisbon’ by the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA). Irish prime minister (Taoiseach) Brian Cowen has apparently assured the farmers that his Government will veto a deal on world trade reform, if it’s unfavourable to Ireland. 

With the 12th of June voting day drawing near, it’s a significant development coming at a time when, to my mind, anti-Lisbon feeling has been on the rise. Aside from contributing to a feeling of ‘everyone’s on board’, the IFA has over 80,000 members, which, when combined with their family members, is a significant voting bloc.

Peter Raber of Salzburg, Austria, won’t be happy. This week, he wrote a letter to the newspaper I work for - Metro Éireann, a multicultural weekly - powerfully setting out what he feels is the disenfranchisement of the people of Europe. And irrespective of which side of the fence you’re leaning on, it’s difficult to disagree with that point (for the record, Peter Raber of Salzburg, Austria is against the ratification of the treaty, citing concerns over sovereignty and neutrality).

Catherine Reilly continues her coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. You can read the rest of the series here, here, here and here.

Catherine Reilly (Dublin, Metro Eireann): On Tuesday, a Danish foreign affairs journalist in Dublin asked me for my ‘call’ on the Lisbon Treaty: which way would it go? There’s no need for the drum roll: I responded that it would be passed, with the caveat that if it had been put to the increasingly disgruntled Irish public a year or two later, it could well be a completely different story. I’m no Nostradamus though, and no commentator either, so this departure from fence-sitting has made for a few nights’ uncomfortable sleep.

My personal feeling is that anti-Lisbon sentiments are gathering pace, but whether or not this is enough to impact upon the relatively slim lead of the Yes side, and turn the over 25 per cent of undecided voters towards a No vote, I’m not sure - and anyone who says otherwise is hedging their bets.

As to the anti-Lisbon arguments, one major issue is emerging: credibility, credibility, credibility. The No camp are evoking dark scenarios of European interference with Ireland’s corporation tax, of the legalisation of abortion and loss of power at the EU table. The latter point seems to ring true, though the first two arguments are significantly less provable. And that’s the problem: no-one really knows who to believe because the text of the Lisbon Treaty can be read in so many different ways. It is all a matter of interpretation.

Catherine Reilly continues her coverage of the Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. You can read the rest of the series here, here and here. 

Catherine Reilly ((Dublin, Metro Eireann ): Is nationalism playing a big part in Ireland’s Lisbon Treaty battle? This was the question posed by BBC Europe editor Mark Mardell in his Euroblog entry on the 19th of May. The short answer is no. The long answer is nope.

However, Mardell picked up on two important issues which could possibly veer some undecided voters towards a No vote. One is the fact that, under the Lisbon Treaty, Ireland would only have a permanent commissioner on a rotating basis. The other is the feeling (communicated to Mardell by a Dublin taxi driver) that the country’s prosperity, funded partly from EU coffers, has been a double-edged sword of samurai proportions.

The latter point is interesting to dwell on. According to the website of the European Commission Representation in Ireland: “While most Irish people will have sped past the blue signs along smooth new roads up and down the country, indicating that ‘This project was co-financed by the EU’, fewer people will be aware of the extent of change that the EU has helped initiate in Ireland. Since joining in 1973, the difference between what Ireland paid in and what the EU paid out is about €55 billion euros.”