FINAL FIGURES:THE LISBON Treaty has been rejected by a majority of 110,000 votes in a valid poll of over 1.6 million.
The result, which came as a surprise to many despite opinion poll evidence in advance of the vote, showed a decisive 53.4 per cent against compared to 46.6 per cent in favour of the treaty on a turnout of 53.13 per cent.
The final figures, given at the main count centre in Dublin Castle yesterday afternoon, were as follows: 862,415 against and 752,451 in favour.
Only 10 of the 43 constituencies in the State voted in favour, in some cases by a slim majority.
The constituencies which voted for the treaty were mostly in Leinster. These included Carlow/Kilkenny, Dublin North, Dublin North-Central, Dublin South, Dublin South-East, Dún Laoghaire, Kildare North, Laois/Offaly and Meath East.
The sole constituency outside Leinster which voted Yes was Clare. The highest number of No votes was in Mayo, political base of Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny, which delivered a thumping 30,001 votes against, with only 18,624 in favour.
The Laois/Offaly constituency of Taoiseach Brian Cowen voted in favour, with 31,786 for the treaty compared to 24,963 against.
With all the Munster constituencies except Clare voting No, the highest number of anti-Lisbon votes in the province was in Cork South-Central, which rejected the treaty by 27,166 to 22,112 votes.
The highest No vote among the Leinster constituencies which voted against the treaty was in Louth, which cast 25,811 votes against and 18,586 votes in favour.
All the constituencies located in Connacht and in the Republic's three Ulster counties voted No, with Mayo delivering the highest vote tally against the treaty.
A total of 28.3 per cent of the electorate vote No - compared with 24.7 per cent of the electorate who voted Yes. There were a total of 6,171 spoiled votes.
Despite the fact that the Green Party did not have a formal position on the treaty, five out of the six constituencies represented by Green TDs voted for the treaty. The sixth constituency of Dublin Midwest voted No, but a Green Party official last night noted that its deputy, Paul Gogarty, took no part in the campaign due to the serious illness of his father, Billy, who subsequently died.
The first referendum on the Nice Treaty in June 2001 resulted in a 54 to 46 per cent victory for the No side on a turnout of just below 35 per cent. The second Nice referendum of October 2002 reversed that decision, with 63 per cent in favour and 37 per cent against on a turnout of 49.47 per cent.
In the case of the Lisbon Treaty, it was widely forecast that the higher the turnout, the greater would be the likelihood of a Yes vote. However, yesterday's result confounded those predictions, since the turnout of 53.13 per cent was even higher than in the case of the second Nice referendum.
The implication of the latest referendum result may be that anti-EU feeling or critical attitudes towards Brussels have increased since the two votes on Nice at the start of the decade. On this occasion there seems to have been a rather greater determination to turn out and reject an EU treaty than in the case of the first vote on Nice.
FIGURES
53.4% - against
46.6% - in favour
10 of the 43 constituencies vote Yes
