Memorandum by Ms Sally DeBono
1. The creation of a full-time, unelected
EU President, who will negotiate directly with the European Commission
on new EU laws, further removes elected national governments from
EU decision-making and erodes their ability to stop legislation
that voters do not want.
2. The creation of an EU Foreign Minister
with supporting diplomatic service, will extend the EU's control
over foreign policy. Article III-300 states that the EU Foreign
Minister will be able to initiate common positions that can be
imposed on individual member countries by a majority vote. Once
agreed, the Foreign Minister will present the common EU position
on the United Nations Security Council (Article lll-305). The
EU diplomatic service aims to make national embassies redundant,
leaving Britain un-represented across the world.
3. The Treaty will extend majority voting
in EU decision-making and cut our voting strength by 30%, so greatly
reducing Britain's influence over new EU laws. 69 national vetoes
will be scrapped, meaning our government can be increasingly out-voted
by other countries and EU laws in more policy areas imposed on
Britain regardless. For example, Article 111-147 of the original
Constitution said that the EU can impose privatisation in any
area of service provision, without the consent of elected national
parliaments.
4. The Treaty will give the Union a legal
personality to make legal agreements in its own right and represent
its members on international bodies, cutting Britain's influence
in the world. Brussels would be able to agree international treaties
with external countries that would be legally binding on Britain
and other EU member states.
5. The Treaty will extend the EU's powers
over criminal justice, through the power to set common definitions
of criminal offences (Article 111-271) and harmonise national
laws through the mutual recognition of judicial decisions (Article
I-42). The establishment of an EU Public Prosecutor will be made
possible (Article III-274). Eurojust will be given new powers
including the "initiation of criminal investigations"
(Article III-273) and the EU's embryonic police force Europol
will be expanded. Its officers will retain their immunity from
criminal prosecution if they break national laws (Article III-276).
6. Article IV-444 will allow the EU to remove
national vetoes in almost all remaining policy areas, and Article
IV-445 will allow sections of the treaty relating to the "internal
policies and action of the Union" to be re-written. This
will allow the EU to self-amend the treaty in future, preventing
major British scrutiny and debate about the EU's powers and direction.
7. The application of the Charter of
Fundamental Rights to FSJ measures: My opinion is that the
Government's Redlines and opt-in/out will not hold. While Art
4 of the Reform Treaty, paragraph 2, states that "national
security remains the sole responsibility of each Member State",
through the Elf's Protection of Critical Infrastructure, the EU,
using Article 308 may for the very first time in the history of
this Country, allow others—the EU—to involve itself
in the very sensitive issue of National Security, again, allegedly
because this is yet another matter that transcends National Borders.
If our National Security is transferred to the EU, it is one of
the greatest betrayals of all, because, in war time, any information
given to the "enemy", is a matter of treason.
In conclusion, I do not see how any Government,
whose first loyalty and solemn Oath of Allegiance is to the Crown
and this Country, could "ask" (which they are not doing)
the people to destroy their own Constitution. Furthermore, I cannot
understand how any Government could accept and ratify such a constitutional
treaty, which, when fully implemented with the inclusion and use
of a self amending Article, would destroy everything that the
people (including my father, who was a World War 2 Bomber pilot)
fought for. (Freedom and Liberty)
I submit this to the House of Lords, who is
the only remaining democratic hope that we, the people of Britain,
have.
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