TREATY CASE:A CATTLEMAN has told a High Court judge he intends challenging the legality of the Government's new referendum on the Lisbon Treaty.
John Burke, of Duncummin House, Emly, Co Tipperary, was granted leave by Mr Justice Liam McKechnie yesterday to serve short notice on the Taoiseach, the Minister for Justice and the State of his intended challenge.
Mr Burke will be allowed to put his case tomorrow for leave to bring a judicial review of the forthcoming referendum.
He told the High Court judge he believed the Irish electorate had on June 12th, 2008, cast their vote in a referendum in which the result was a definite No.
“That vote still stands and the Taoiseach has since told the electorate they have been misinformed and that they will have to vote until such time as they decide to vote the opposite,” Mr Burke told the court.
He said the Taoiseach had admitted he had not read the text of the treaty. Mr Burke said the Taoiseach had told the electorate that if they voted again he would assure them that certain crucial issues, which would affect the well-being and stability of Ireland for generations to come, would be legally dismissed from the treaty.
He had told the electorate they would effectively be voting on an amended treaty to that which they had already rejected.
He said that by imposing a second vote on the Irish people, the Taoiseach was in direct breach of his duty to uphold the Constitution which could not co-exist with the Lisbon Treaty. Mr Burke wants the original vote to be declared as passed and the forthcoming referendum to be declared unconstitutional.
Mr Burke told the court he was seeking a judicial review of the Government’s October 2nd referendum on the grounds that no means no and that no written evidence of legal changes to the treaty had been put before the electorate.