Thread: Real people 1, Eurocrats 0 (after extra time)

From The Sunday Times
June 15, 2008

Real people 1, Eurocrats 0 (after extra time)

The voters of Ireland left the EU’s constitutional plans in tatters last week by rejecting the Lisbon treaty. Now the European political elite is desperately trying to find a way to get round their verdict

Nicola Smith in Brussels, Stephen O'Brien in Dublin, Matthew Campbell in Paris and Jonathan Oliver

As celebrations go it was not a typically Irish affair. Late on Friday night the key figures in the Libertas group, which had led the successful campaign in the republic for a no vote on the European Union’s Lisbon constitutional treaty, gathered in the bar of the Burlington hotel in the centre of Dublin. The atmosphere was surprisingly sober.

Declan Ganley, the 39-year-old London-born entrepreneur, had just played a key role in one of the most crushing defeats that the Irish and European political establishments had ever suffered. His organisation, a think tank containing no elected politicians, had come from nowhere to achieve a result that has sent shockwaves throughout the EU.

Irish politicians, pundits and businessmen had been almost as one in urging the country’s people to support the treaty that would drive forward the federalist aims of the union.
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Yet, against all predictions, the voters had refused, returning a no verdict by the margin of 53.4% to 46.6%.

After that, all Ganley wanted was a soft drink and the chance to chat to family and friends. He is a teetotaller. The man who had left Europe shaken and stirred was having nothing stronger than a glass of Coca-Cola.

Even if he were a drinker, he might have held off. He knew that the revellers were celebrating victory in a battle, not a war. He was still in campaign mode as the crowd in the hotel bar congratulated him.

“This is just the first part,â€

GO IRISH! Stand your ground!!