Product plugging by Christopher Booker

In The Telegraph, Christopher Booker made a lot of noise about contempt for Parliament and the like. According to Booker, the Government asks MPs to approve the EU treaty even before they have a proper chance to examine what it is they are voting on.

Booker then goes on to plug the consolidated Lisbon Treaty being prepared by the end of the week by a private firm: “a 331-page text of the treaty with invaluable analysis” (cost £27.50).

I am not going into the interesting questions of journalistic ethics concerning product placement or downright marketing, but I sincerely hope that others will.

***

The Council’s refusal to publish consolidated versions of the Treaty of Lisbon, “putting all those amendments in context, in such a way that their significance can be understood” as Booker says, is a serious drawback for democratic debate in Europe.

Therefore, the readers of this blog have been kept aware of the different consolidated language versions that have been published, as far as I have been able to find out.

English speakers are, relatively speaking, in the enviable position to have three different consolidations of the Reform Treaty available, for free. Perhaps there is cause to mention the consolidated Lisbon Treaties in English again:


IIEA

Peadar ó Broin at the Institute of International and European Affairs (Dublin, Ireland) has produced a complete consolidation of the amended treaties, including the protocols and annexes, in a format easy to read

Treaty on European Union
Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union
Annexes to the EU and FEU Treaties
Protocols to the EU and FEU Treaties and, where appropriate, to the EAEC Treaty

Go to http://www.iiea.com


Statewatch

Professor Steve Peers has painstakingly compiled a version consisting of several files for the Statewatch Observatory on the EU Constitution and the Reform Treaty, where likenesses and differences between the different reform stages are highlighted

Go to http://www.statewatch.org


Markus Walther


Markus Walther, who produced and published a German consolidated version of the EU Treaty of Lisbon on his web site, has posted an English readable consolidated version as well (a preliminary document without protocols and charter).

Go to http://www.mwalther.net/europa/eulaw-lisbon-mwalther.pdf


Other resources

Other resources on the Lisbon Treaty have been mentioned here frequently, with the latest posting dated yesterday, on some of the UK Parliamentary documents.

***

If Booker wants to scandalise the British government and market valuable books, they are his choices.

But the information already exists for those who are interested in the facts.


Ralf Grahn


Source:

Christopher Booker’s Notebook: MPs required to ratify Lisbon treaty without reading it; The Telegraph 19/01/2008;
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml%3Bjsessionid%3D2V4OJ542O2YSDQFIQMFCFGGAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2008/01/20/nbooker120.xml