Madam, - Now for the reality check! The quicker we Irish realise that membership of the European Union is a privilege rather than a right, the better. As a small, peripheral nation we have little strategic significance but we have enjoyed enormous economic benefit and disproportionate influence because of our positive role in the overall project. This latest display of irresponsible self-indulgence and "me féinism" has decisively blown that.
To think that the other 26 democratically elected governments will now turn themselves inside out trying to satisfy our ill-defined and frequently irrelevant reservations would be naive in the extreme. Already the signals are clear: they are determined to press on and not have the interests of their 500 million people prejudiced by our intransigence. However it is packaged or presented, they will now focus on finding a way around our roadblock and implementing the core elements of the Reform Treaty.
Our European partners are rightly throwing the ball back to our Government to find a solution. A re-run of the referendum with clarifications is the most likely outcome. Hopefully we will have one more chance to show that we have not become so smug and detached from reality as to forget which side our bread is buttered on. Next time we had better get it right. The social and economic consequences of being left outside the door of an advancing European Union are unthinkable.
- Yours, etc,
RORY O'MAHONY, Talbots Inch, Kilkenny.
Madam, - Is there any hope that the EU Commission and the main political parties in Ireland will get the message that it is they who got it wrong, and that the people of Ireland got it right? As a proud and committed European, I await a more humble, democratic and embracing new agreement, constitution or treaty, or whatever it may be called, as long as it democratically approved by the peoples of Europe and not by self-interested factions or so-called representatives who think they know what the people really need.
The people of Ireland have decided that the Lisbon Treaty should be consigned to the rubbish bin. So be it! Let others in Europe respect that decision.
- Yours, etc,
MICHAEL J McCANN, Crodaun, Celbridge, Co Kildare.
Madam, - Padraig Walshe and the IFA must share a large portion of blame for the failure of the Lisbon Treaty referendum. The cynical decision to use their support for the referendum as a bargaining chip in their dispute with the Government over the WTO issue generated significant rural opposition to the Lisbon Treaty which couldn't simply be switched off by a few ads in the Farmers Journal. As a successful lobbying organisation the IFA knows that influence and goodwill are worth a thousand vetoes. As Ireland's standing in the EU takes a hammering, the IFA may find the corridors of power in Brussels to be very unfriendly places in the months and years to come.
- Yours, etc,
MIKE BURKE, Clooncahir, Mohill, Co Leitrim.
Madam, - Since the result of the Lisbon referendum, most of the questions have been asked of the No side. I would like to pose some to those who voted Yes. Why did you vote for a Europe which is patently undemocratic? Why did you vote for a Europe which forces poor countries to adopt free-market economic policies which do not suit them? Why did you vote for a Europe which slavishly follows the foreign policies of George Bush? Why did you vote for a Europe which has colluded in torture and illegal renditions of terrorist suspects, many of them proven to be innocent?
Why did you vote for a Europe which has ruined our fishing industry? Why did you vote for a Europe which destroys vast quantities of food each year? Why did you vote for a Europe which is still in Nato, the most belligerent war machine in the world? I am very "pro-Europe" but the Europe I want is not the Europe I see and not a Europe of which anyone could be proud.
I believe the No voters have done a great service to Europe, if only the political elite and the "Brussels fat cats" have the good sense to listen and learn. I won't hold my breath, however.
- Yours, etc,
ALAN McPARTLAND, Rathfarnham, Dublin 16.
Madam, - It is unlikely that the Lisbon Treaty was rejected because of the arguments and ideologies of No campaigners. The more probable cause is the incompetence and ineptitude of the Yes campaigners in selling the treaty.
For decades, the Irish political class have sold the EU as an ATM, but failed to sell Europe's vision and deeper benefits. In addition, they repeatedly blamed Europe for their own mistakes, and claimed credit for Europe's good ideas.
Fianna Fáil must take the lion's share of blame for a pathetic Yes campaign. We had a Taoiseach and Commissioner who didn't read the treaty and a Tánaiste who didn't know how many commissioners they were.
Fianna Fáil was more interested in Bertie Ahern's "lap of honour", and in promoting him as a "sure bet" for European President, rather than promoting the treaty.
European politicians are not blameless either. They deliberately wrote an obscure and complicated treaty hoping the electorate would be tricked into voting for it.
They also deliberately denied their own electorates a direct say, raising doubts about their real commitment to democracy and suspicions about what they are hiding.
This wasn't a vote against Europe, but against the political establishment, and its dishonest culture of spin, evasive answers, and double-speak.
Ireland, like America, needs Obama to bring a radical change in political attitudes and thinking. But do we have one?
- Yours, etc,
JASON FITZHARRIS, Rivervalley, Swords, Co Dublin.
Madam, - May I wholeheartedly compliment Breda O'Brien on her column of June 14th ("The people have spoken-and they are not loo-lahs")?
I am five generations removed from Ballyjamesduff, but I follow the Ireland of today, not that of 1860. I travel in Europe often and teach law one week every year in the Czech Republic, and am thus fascinated by the development of the EU.
Politicians (and political analysts in the media) take serious risks when they treat the voters as the great unwashed who need only to listen to their biggers, betters and brighters on such core emotional and cultural issues as national identity and direction.
As a recovering politician, I would agree strongly with her point that "there is a massive need to work on understanding why people right across Europe are not persuaded that the EU represents something truly worthy of loyalty and allegiance". In talking with professionals and ordinary citizens from Ireland, the UK, the Czech and Slovak republics and elsewhere, I sense that the re-evaluation Ms O'Brien calls for is essential to prevent the eventual and painful dissolution of a political or economic structure that does not have a solid foundation in the loyalties of the ordinary people of the continent.
- Yours, etc,
JOHN SMIETANKA, Attorney at Law, Grandville, Michigan, USA.
A Chara, - So Ireland's European policy is now to be dictated and represented by the against-everything-always reactionaries of Sinn Féin, the pro-Bush neo-cons of Libertas and a smattering of other permanent protest groups - not least of which is the detritus of Youth Defence?
While the individual supporters of this quite unreal coalition would fail to attain numbers of any great significance, through a combination of lies and deliberate misrepresentation they managed to sow enough confusion among the public to frighten a majority of electors into voting No.
Myths about abortion, euthanasia, conscription, loss of neutrality/sovereignty and higher taxes were all features of the despicable tactics used.
The Lisbon Treaty wasPlan B. The rejection of the European Constitution, by France and Holland led to a process of extensive renegotiation among 27 member-states, all of whose sovereign governments managed, against the odds, to agree on a text which we were asked to ratify last Friday. The rest of the EU is now pressing ahead and by the end of the year 26 countries will have declared their satisfaction with the treaty and their intention to proceed with reform of the EU.
Given the enormous influence and input Ireland had into the document, the suggestion that we now alone, of all countries, should seek a further unravelling and re-renegotiation is just not credible, and thus the choices we face are stark. But then those who plotted the agenda of the No campaign knew that all along, and for them the end justifies the means.
Overall, quite brilliant strategic and political planning, but it's outrageous that we sat back and let it happen.
- Is mise,
DAVID CARROLL, Castle Gate, Dublin 2.
Madam, - I am sure there will be many complex theories about why the Lisbon Treaty was not passed. I feel the simple answer is that the electorate have demonstrated that they no longer trust their political representatives.
From the sometimes incredible evidence at the Mahon Tribunal to the opportunistic publicising of election candidates on referendum posters, the leaders of the political establishment have displayed an arrogant disregard for the electorate's intelligence. They now reap what they have sown.
- Yours, etc,
SEÁN HOGAN, Fisherman's Grove, Dunmore East, Co Waterford.
Madam, - The rejection of the Lisbon Treaty need only be a major setback to the EU if the Irish people are really opposed to streamlining the running of the enlarged Union.
It seems more likely that they have simply voted No out of fear of a bureaucracy about which they were insufficiently informed by the Government, and deliberately misinformed by lobby groups.
It is up to the Government to confirm or convincingly refute the claims of the lobby groups, and to get beyond the knee-jerk reaction to find out what the people really think, and whether their fears are justified.
It's a shame they couldn't have done this before the referendum.
- Yours, etc,
BEN PHALAN, University of Cambridge, England.
Madam, - Last week I travelled through counties Wexford, Waterford, Cork, Kerry, Limerick and Tipperary. I saw a lot of "No" posters with various messages. I saw many fewer "Yes" posters — all with "Vote Yes" and a smiling politician's face.
The only message I received from these was "Vote yes - trust me". Some message!
- Yours, etc,
KEVIN TREACY, Lower South Knock, New Ross, Co Wexford.