United Kingdom European Constitution Referendum - Announcement

Announcement

As negotiations finalizing the text of the proposed constitution drew to a close in early 2004, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair, had consistently denied the need for a referendum on its ratification. However, on 20 April 2004, he announced in the House of Commons that a referendum would in fact be held, assuming the treaty was accepted by the European Council.

In his Commons address, Blair stated that what he regards as myths about the European Union, were so prevalent that "it is right to confront this campaign head-on". Blair made no specific reference to a referendum – indeed observers pointed out that Blair refrained from using words such as "referendum" and "plebiscite" at all, instead leaving the explicit announcement to a White Paper published simultaneously by Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary.

Initial reaction amongst the opposition was three-fold. Firstly, the Conservatives were pleased as they felt they had forced Tony Blair into a U-turn. For example Michael Howard, the Leader of the Opposition, said "Who will ever trust you again?" in his response to Blair's statement. In response, opponents of Howard have said that he himself has done a U-turn by asking for a referendum at all. Howard was a member of the Conservative Government that rejected calls for a referendum on the Maastricht Treaty in 1993. This treaty conferred many new competences on the Union, something that the new constitution does not do; this has led to some commentators arguing that it is inconsistent to demand a referendum on the constitutional treaty when one was not held on the Maastricht Treaty.

Secondly, the Conservative Party repeated its opposition to such a constitution which it sees as involving an unacceptable loss of sovereignty. (See Controversy over the new constitution.)

They then wanted to know about the timing of the referendum and the precise wording of its question. Commentators expected that a referendum would not be held until after the next General Election, which was expected to take place in 2005. They suggested that the Labour Party would want to minimise the impact of the issue of Europe on the election campaign by saying "we can discuss that at the referendum".

Some pro-Europeans believe this is because much of the press (e.g. papers owned by News International) in the UK opposes the treaty, as referred to by Blair above. Others refer to what they see as a large amount of misinformation and confusion about what the proposed treaty actually contains, coupled with a widespread scepticism about all things linked with the European Union.

Supporters of the Government have said that a referendum would need to be held after sufficient parliamentary time has been devoted to analysing the text, thus forcing a delay until after the election. Conversely, the Conservatives rejected this, saying that sufficient scrutiny could be given, and a referendum held, in the autumn and winter of 2004.

The Conservatives have also suggestedthat if the Treaty were rejected, the current government would repeat the referendum until it got its desired result. In the days after the announcement of the vote, government policy was not immediately clear on this issue: it initially said that the UK would then be in the same position as Ireland was, after it rejected the Nice treaty. Ireland subsequently adopted that treaty after a second referendum, suggesting that Britain may attempt to do the same. Denmark also held two referendums before accepting the Maastricht treaty.

However, at his usual monthly news conference on April 22, Blair said: "If the British people vote 'no', they vote 'no'. You can't keep bringing it back until they vote 'yes'." BBC Radio 4 and The Times have subsequently reported some back-tracking on this issue from "Number 10" (presumably the press office). Despite Blair's assertions (he has made several other, similar statements), the position remains not entirely clear.