EU Internal Market Commissioner Charlie McCreevy has said Ireland should not apologise for its No vote in last week’s referendum.
Mr McCreevy said the Lisbon Treaty referendum was a democratic process in which issues were debated.
“The Irish people decided to vote No and that has to be respected by the other 26 countries,” he told RTÉ radio today.
Charlie McCreevy
Mr McCreevy said the whole construct of the EU is that decisions are arrived at by consensus. “It was clearly understood that this treaty had to be ratified by all 27 member states”.
However, he said this did not prevent the governments coming up with new arrangements which are in the best interests of the Ireland and EU.
“The basis of the success of the European project has been that nobody is bullied and Ireland will not be bullied,” he added.
Mr McCreevy has been on record as saying he did not read the treaty himself. During the referendum campaign, No groups seized upon this as proof of the difficulty in understanding what was being voted on.
But Mr McCreevy insists that failing to understand the treaty was no justification for rejecting it.
“The treaty refers to sub-paragraphs of former sub-paragraphs and other documents and there is no person this side of Timbuktu who would be in a position to understand it," he said.
Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny said the treaty cannot be put to a vote again in Ireland without changes.
Mr Kenny insisted there should be no “knee-jerk” reaction to the No vote and that Europe had to respect Ireland’s position but Ireland also had to respect the right of other countries continuing the ratification process.
Also speaking on RTÉ radio, Mr Kenny said: “The crux is going to arise if and when the remaining 26 states ratify the treaty.”
“We have to look to the future between this and that point to see how the decision of the Irish people is both respected and understood and how Europe is going to become more relevant to its citizens in the times ahead.”