Madam, - Dana Rosemary Scallon (Nov 1st) is clearly of the view that the Taoiseach and most of the political establishment are quite comfortable with seeing our National Constitution subsumed by the proposed EU model.
Ms Scallon is adamant that we are being asked to be party to a binding legal arrangement that "turns the EU into a super-state with its own legal personality and an existence separate from, and superior to, member-states". She also argues that the EU Constitution will take precedence over Ireland's Constitution. All of this is predictable stuff from Ms Scallon and regrettably, like a lot of what she utters on EU issues, a gross distortion of the facts.
The primacy of Union Law is a long established principle that has prevailed since before Ireland joined the European Communities in 1973. This concept is at the very core of how the EU functions. The only powers the Union has are those the member-states unanimously choose to give it, as the European Constitution makes clearer than ever before.
Moreover, the European Constitution does not involve any significant or wide-ranging shift of new responsibility to the Union. As has always been the case, once a given decision has been taken under the agreed rules, each member is duty bound to implement it and accept the interpretation offered by the European Court of Justice.
This has always been the way that the EU has functioned and it will be no different with the European Constitution. Any other approach would be a recipe for paralysis and confusion.
Crucially, this does not mean that Bunreacht na hÉireann becomes subservient to the EU Constitution, as Ms Scallon seems to believe. The existing constitutions of member-states will remain as the basic legal documents of each state. And as the Taoiseach himself stated recently in your newspaper, "the European Constitution does not replace national constitutions, which remain supreme in the national sphere". The situation will effectively remain unchang- ed from that prevailing since we joined.
The Irish Government, for its part, will not be found wanting in the months ahead in championing a document that sets out a progressive and balanced blueprint for the future development of the EU and will serve the people of Ireland and Europe for many years to come.
The debate will no doubt be a robust one. However, one would hope that it will at least be conducted with some respect for the facts. - Yours, etc.,
NOEL TREACY TD, Minister for European Affairs, Department of An Taoiseach, Government Buildings, Dublin 2.
Madam, - In her article on the EU Constitution (Nov 1st ), Dana Rosemary Scallon uses phrases to deliberately scaremonger the Irish people to shore up the No vote. "The Taoiseach signed up to a treaty that. . . 'shall have primacy over the law of the member state.' "
Undoubtedly this is true, but Ms Scallon makes an embarrassing effort to present this as a new departure for Ireland's membership of the EU.
I am horrified and appalled to think that Ireland had an MEP who didn't understand one of the fundamental institutions of the EU. The European Court of Justice has progressively developed legal supremacy since the 1960s. This began most notably with the van Gend en Loos case of 1963, dealing with custom duties. By 1972, with ICI and others v Commission, the court had developed extra-territorial jurisdiction where pharmaceutical companies based outside the EEC were found in breach of EEC competition law.
National courts can give rulings on cases involving EU law, but under Article 234 (ex art. 177) they can refer to the ECJ for interpretations of the treaty.
Any time that national law and EU law conflict, EU law will override to ensure legal uniformity for all European citizens.
The Constitution changes none of this. The points Ms Scallon raises regarding legal supremacy and the further erosion of our sovereignty should have been made in 1973, when those issues were a new departure.
For all intents and purposes, this Constitution is the consolidation and clarification of previous EU treaties. While it's probable that Ms Scallon does in fact know the history of EU law, she seems to be manipulating less informed minds with such provoking rhetoric. I'm sure that either side of the debate could find more factually based issues to argue about. - Is mise,
SARAH MURPHY, Innishmore Court , Ballincollig, Co Cork.