Dan Boyle (Cork South Central, Green Party)

Debate on the future of the European Union is always welcome, but a debate on the White Paper submitted by the Government on the future of the constitutional European Union treaty is a surreal event. This is a dead treaty. It is no more.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs may protest as much as he likes about being a democrat and say that two states have indicated support in referenda, but two other states have not. If we aggregate the four countries, the people have dramatically said "No" to this treaty, not to the European Union itself. The difficulty in the progress of the European Union is not with the idea of a European Union or whether it could and should progress, it is about the vision being imposed by too small a group of people that did not involve the wider populace of the European countries involved in membership. If that lesson is not taken on board by the elites which are involved in the decision-making processes in the 25 member states, further progress will be very difficult, if not impossible.

The Green Party has been constantly misrepresented as being anti-EU, even though it favours further integration and the continued development of a European idea. It does not want to see the development of a European Union that is not democratic and people-centred.

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