MEP brands treaty referendum calls 'absurd'

UK demands for a referendum on the EU reform treaty have been dismissed as 'absurd' and 'intellectually dishonest'.

Former European convention member Gisela Stuart, a senior UK Labour MP, is among an estimated 40 British Socialist national parliamentarians who have begun pushing for a referendum.

Also behind the campaign is Ian Davidson, an MP close to new UK premier Gordon Brown.

But the calls, also voiced by the Tories - most recently in a speech this week by Conservative foreign affairs spokesman William Hague - were dismissed by UK Socialist MEP Richard Corbett.

Corbett, his party’s spokesman on constitutional affairs in parliament, said, "The Labour government promised a referendum on the treaty precisely because it was constitutional."

"The reform treaty is not constitutional and amounts to a set of modest reforms to the existing EU structure."
 
"Britain has never had a referendum to ratify an international treaty and it is absurd to demand one on a treaty that does modest things like changing the length of the European council presidency from 6 months to 30 months."

Over the next six weeks, legal experts will work on the text of the treaty, closely watched by the designated political representatives, or "sherpas", of the member sates.

EU foreign ministers will assess their progress at an informal meeting in Portugal in September.

It is not yet known if the European parliament will produce a report on the outcome of the intergovernmental conference launched in Brussels on Monday.

Parliament has three representatives on the body, UK Liberal Andrew Duff, German EPP-ED deputy Elmar Brok and Spanish Socialist Enrique Baron Crespo.

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