BRUSSELS: The Government is keen to delay the next referendum on a new European Union treaty until 2006, on the grounds that the public could reject further speedy change to the country's relationship with the EU.
The Convention on the Future of Europe is due to produce a first draft of a new treaty by late June, though negotiations between member-states on its contents are not likely to begin until October or November.
The Italians, who will hold the EU presidency for the last six months of the year, are keen for the signing of the new treaty to take place in Rome.
However, an agreement by then is unlikely. A deal could be reached during the Irish EU presidency in the first half of 2004, though delays could see it slipping further into the subsequent Dutch presidency.
In any event, senior figures in the Department of Foreign Affairs and elsewhere in Government are intent on taking as long as possible afterwards to ratify it.
Under EU law, member-states are given two years to ratify treaties. "There will be no enthusiasm to do this in a hurry. We were the first last time. We will be amongst the last next time out," one source commented.
Meanwhile, the Government faces "a tough battle" to ensure that smaller member-states do not lose the right to take the helm of the European Council for six months.
Under a compromise formula, the Government has proposed the appointment of a secretary general to the Council to improve co-ordination and planning.
In addition, EU member-states should agree work plans every few years to ensure that a consistent agenda is followed between different presidencies, said the Minister of State for Europe, Mr Dick Roche.
"This would stop countries coming in for six months and putting up their favourite decorations and then walking away," he told the Oireachtas European Affairs Committee.
Despite the European Commission's decision to now favour each country's right to have a Commissioner, the Government believes that the compromise worked out in the Nice Treaty will stand.
Then, EU states agreed that states would have just one commissioner each from 2005 and that the number would be capped at 27. At that point EU leaders would have to agree unanimously upon its future size.
Every country, regardless of size, would lose its place at the table in strict rotation if EU leaders agreed to have fewer commissioners than member-states.
Any changes to the deal made in Nice would reopen the debate about the voting weight enjoyed by each state, which gave more influence to the larger member-states.
However, the Spanish government, which had favoured greater change, has altered its stance in recent times, having realised that a reopening of the Nice result would endanger gains it made then.
Finally, the Irish Government has rejected efforts to cut the number of MEPs to 700 - down from the 732 agreed in Nice - because this would discriminate against small states.