CALLS FOR the President to invoke a little known article of the Constitution to trigger a referendum on Europe’s new fiscal treaty can only be met if the measure is defeated in the Seanad, according to legal experts.
The Dáil’s Technical Group, composed of Independent and small party TDs, proposed yesterday that article 27 of the Constitution should be invoked to force a referendum.
Under the article the President can call a referendum on the basis of a petition backed by a majority of the Seanad and one-third of the Dáil’s members. However, this provision can only be invoked if a Government Bill is first defeated in a vote in the Seanad.
The Coalition has 30 members in the 60-member Seanad, excluding the Cathaoirleach, while a further seven Independents are Taoiseach’s nominees. This makes a Government defeat on the treaty in the Seanad unlikely, unless some Fine Gael or Labour senators and all the Taoiseach’s nominees vote against the Coalition.
The treaty will come before the Dáil and Seanad in the form of an enabling Bill if Attorney General Máire Whelan deems that it is constitutional.
If the Bill is passed by both Houses it will go to President Michael D Higgins for signature. He will have the option of referring it to the Supreme Court, having consulted the Council of State.
Independent Donegal TD Thomas Pringle said on behalf of the Technical Group yesterday the mechanism in article 27, never used before, could allow TDs and Senators to petition Mr Higgins on the matter.
Mr Pringle said the group would need the support of one-third of all TDs and half of Senators. He calculated the Dáil membership of Fianna Fáil, Sinn Féin, Independents and United Left Alliance (ULA) TDs amounted to 52.
With 55 of the Dáil’s 166 deputies required to achieve a third, he conceded the group would require a number of Government TDs to come forward.
Mr Pringle said he had taken legal advice on the matter and would be publishing the petition in the coming weeks.
Mr Pringle said if the Government was so convinced it was doing the right thing with regard to the fiscal treaty, then it should not be worried about making its arguments to the people.
“This mechanism was inserted into the Constitution all those years ago to ensure that even when there’s no constitutional requirement for it, there is a means by which the people may be consulted on matters of significant public interest.”
He said even if there was no legal requirement to put the treaty to the people, there was a “moral requirement” to do so.
