6. Negativity and the French . Through out the campaign Much of the talk about the treaty was how we will become isolated , how we will be damaged and this negativity was totally encapsulated by French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner stupid quote of the campaign. The Irish will come “the first Victims” if this is rejected. It is a bit of a cliced but Ireland are a nation with “a victim mentality” We feel easily threatened and respond to it with a kind of “F**K You bravado. Some people who would have voted yes voted no just to stand up to the perceived bullying. If you say to people, do what I say or suffer people will not always back down and most cases face down the received bullying

5. Fighting the Ellite. The way the treaty was sold was terrible. One of the ways it was sold was by the great and the good acting condescendingly to the no side. There seemed to be an atmosphere of we are your betters trust us. This came from all the political parties and the media. Last night Fintan O’Toole said on BBC Newsnight that the reason it was rejected was because of Bertie Ahern making people distrustful of politicians. This is nonsense. People were distrustful of politicians far before that. Indeed we have been distrustful of anyone in power since the year dot. The fact that the likes of Fintan O’Toole stated that this is the reason is itself condescending to people who voted no. Insinuating that the no vote is not a vote against the Treaty but against the Bertie Ahern is in itself elitist. Making it seem that the no voters could not make up there minds themselves. This sort of establishment mentality of trivializing the no concerns made people more belligerent and vote no. The political parties also seemed to be talking down to the electorate. Presuming that the people would do what they say and not think for themselves. They seemed to sell the fact they themselves were saying yes rather then the contents of the treaty

4. EU Spokespeople: Lucinda and Dick Roche were not the ideal people to do early running setting out the Yes agenda while the others waited to see who would succeed Bertie Ahern. While they went much quieter towards the end of the campaign, my own experience was that they were as likely to turn people off their position or voting than support them. It defies logic to my mind that Ahern put Dick in there since he needed to sell strong on the treaty. The spokespeople on the no side might not have been any great shakes either but they had the advantage of a natural scepticism from the electorate.

3. Voting no was ‘pro-EU’: For the first time in the history of EU referenda in this country it was legitimately presented that a vote against the Lisbon treaty was a vote in favour of Europe. The people who consider themselves pro-EU were never able to rationalise a no vote in this way before since most of those opposed to EU would end up taking us out of Europe. The benefit that Libertas brought was an economically minded argument in support of the present EU which allowed those who were “neither hard left nor hard right” to vote against Lisbon and remain supportive of the EU as it is at present. That swung more people than the core 20% against Europe and allowed the no vote to win the day.

2. Class Voting: Ireland has seen an extensive sociological change over the past ten years but it is inescapable that the referendum results point to a stark difference between the more well off in this country and middle class, working class, labourers, farmers etc. Rural Ireland, fishing villages, poorer constituencies all went against Lisbon. Wealthier areas supported Lisbon but – tellingly – there were not enough of them to carry the day. Class may not have dominated our politics but the divide today suggests that a break exists between the establishment, their supporters and the rest of the country. To what extent this informs future politics is difficult to tell but I suspect that upon having delivered a swift kick to the arse, the electorate will revert to type.

1. The Treaty. The Treaty had three flaws that made it lose. One was the loss of a commissioner the other was its length. The EU is seen as a distant entity away from the control of the people. The idea that Ireland would lose what little control they had scarred people. The idea that we could have no say in important matters is not something people wanted to consider and rejected it. The control of Taxes were not set in stone. No one knew what the future of low tax Ireland would be.