IMPLEMENTATION:ANTI-LISBON Treaty group Libertas has criticised the withholding of a European Parliament report on the institutional implementation of the treaty until after next month's referendum, so as not to "interfere" with the result.
The text of the report by the parliament's committee on constitutional affairs will not be available until June 16th, a spokeswoman for the Belgian MEP who drafted the report, Jean-Luc Dehaene, told The Irish Times last night.
The report outlines how the proposed changes enabled by the treaty would be implemented across the EU.
"Disclosure of the report would give a great insight into the measures being planned by Brussels in the event that the people of Ireland say 'yes' to the treaty," Libertas said in a statement.
At a meeting of the committee in Brussels on Wednesday, Mr Dehaene requested that the report not be disclosed until after the Irish referendum on June 12th. Ireland is the only member state to hold a referendum on the treaty.
Christophe Beaudouin, a French lawyer who attended the meeting, said Mr Dehaene told the committee the report should be made available after the referendum because "we should not give this argument to the Irish No campaign".
Mr Beaudouin works for the IndDem group in the European parliament and previously campaigned against the precursor to the Lisbon Treaty, rejected by French and Dutch voters in referendums held in 2005.
Mr Dehaene was not available for comment, but his spokeswoman insisted the committee did not postpone the disclosure of the report but merely decided on the date it should be made available.
"Mr Dehaene cannot recall how exactly he phrased it in the meeting but he made the point that it is only fair to wait for the results of the referendum on a treaty before you start discussing how to implement that treaty," she said. "He said they didn't want to interfere in the referendum because it would not be helpful to do so."
Libertas founder Declan Ganley argued that the withholding of the report was "evidence that the European Union is unwilling to tell the Irish people how Lisbon will affect them. There is absolutely no way we can vote for a treaty when we are deliberately not being told what it means, and how it will be implemented".
He called for the report to be published immediately, adding that he hoped the Government would do the same.