Allister joins Eurosceptic Protest in Strasbourg
12 December 2007
Traditional Unionist MEP Jim Allister was among a large group of Eurosceptic MEPs who demonstrated today in the Strasbourg Parliament to demand a referendum on the new EU Reform Treaty (Constitution), which will be signed tomorrow by European Heads of Government.
The vigorous protest, from the UK perspective, centred on the fact that despite the Reform Treaty delivering everything the Constitution provided for, the British Government has reneged on its manifesto commitment to hold a referendum. Using the signing of the Constitution's Charter on Fundamental Rights as the occasion, the protesting MEPs highlighted the denial of the right to vote in pushing through the Constitution without referenda.
Speaking earlier in the debate on the subject Jim Allister said:-
"We talk grandly about European values of democracy. Today we will have a pretentious affirmation of belief in Human Rights. Yet at the same time, the EU elite are preparing to celebrate their greatest stroke of arrogance to date, as they make ready to sign the repackaged Constitution, without a backward glance to what their people want or think.
The 2005 referenda showed Europe out of touch, but the lesson learnt is not to abandon what the people don't want, but to circumvent their opposition by determining this time not to ask them. Hence, the scandal that across this continent national powers will be stripped away, superstatehood structures will be established, a new EU citizenship will be created, legal personality will be bestowed on the EU, and only a handful of citizens will ever be asked. Why? Because in most states, my own included, the leaders fear the verdict of the people, adding cowardice to arrogance.
So on a day when these is much talk of human rights, I say give the peoples of Europe the basic political and human right, the right to say yes or no to how they should be governed. The right to say yes or no to this Constitution in referendum."
