THE LISBON Treaty is a "right-wing" text designed to create a "federal state of Europe", former British Labour cabinet minister Tony Benn told audiences in Dublin yesterday.
The veteran left-winger, who earlier this year wrote a letter to every Westminster MP detailing why Britain should have a referendum on the treaty, outlined his opposition to its provisions at public meetings held at DIT Bolton Street and Trinity College.
"I'm not here to tell you how to vote, but to tell you our future depends on what you do in this referendum," he told those gathered at DIT Bolton Street.
Mr Benn said the Lisbon Treaty was the last in a series of treaties that aimed to create a "federal state" of Europe: "I don't want to go back to the old Europe . . . but the truth is that this is designed to replace our domestic democracies with European bureaucracy."
Speaking to The Irish Times before the meetings, Mr Benn said he was in Ireland to highlight some concerns about the treaty, the subject of the June 12th referendum. He was invited as a guest of Sinn Féin, the only major political party campaigning for a No. "It's funny that I have come to Ireland to be able to take part in a referendum which my government won't allow. I find that amazing," Mr Benn said.
He stressed that his opposition was largely based on concerns that the EU was becoming less democratic. "It's a democratic argument, it isn't anti-European at all. This idea that you're anti-European if you vote No is rubbish. When Mrs Thatcher was prime minister, I wasn't anti-British. I'm not anti-American because Bush is there. It's a question of what sort of Europe."
Mr Benn argued that with the Lisbon Treaty, Europe will become a "fully fledged" state.
"It will have its own president we won't elect, it will have a foreign minister we won't elect, and a military function. In effect they are creating a federal Europe run by people we don't elect . . . You and I are citizens of that state whether we wanted it or not. I think that has been got through by default . . . telling people it's boring, don't bother about it, and yet it is very central particularly if there is a military role for Europe."
"I really am frightened by the idea of the whole continent being governed by people we don't elect and cannot remove."
Describing the treaty as a "very, very right-wing constitution", Mr Benn said he was concerned about the way the text was explicitly committed to the free market and capitalism. With the credit crunch, he said, such reliance on the market could backfire. "It's a very strange phenomenon and I think it could, in the end, if you are not careful, lead to a break-up, to nationalism," he added.
Voters should reject treaty because it is not democratic: Opinion, page 13