What they say in the rest of Europe about the treaty

Gordon Brown's government is trying to persuade us that they don't need to keep their promise of a referendum on the proposed EU consitution because the reform treaty which they now propose to ratify is quite different. It is interesting to see what the other governments who negotiated the treaty say about this.


Jose Zapatero, Prime Minister of Spain:

'We have not let a single substantial point of the constitutional treaty go.'


Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Prime Minister of Denmark

'All the symbolic elements are gone, and that which really matters is left.'


Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany:

'The substance of the constitution is preserved. That is a fact.'


Astrid Thors, Europe Minister, Finland:

'There's nothing from the original institutional package that has been changed'


Vaclac Klaus, Prime Minister of the Czech Republic:

'Only cosmetic changes have been made and the basic document remains the same'


Bertie Ahern, Prime Minister of Ireland

'90% of it is still there ... these changes haven't made any dramatic change to the substance of what was agreed in 2004'


The impartial think tank Open Europe has also found that the text of the current reform treaty and the previous consitutional treaty are 96% the same.

Whether or not you think we should have a referendum on this treaty, which I do, the fact that Gordon Brown is pretending that it is significantly different to the previous constitution is further proof that his word cannot be trusted.

(Much of the information in this post came from the Sunday Times)

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