Slugger O'Toole

A member of the Irish Labour Party for close to a decade, I'm classically republican in a civic humanist tradition, with a side serving of middle class socialism. Approaching middle age, internationalist in outlook, I believe in the Rule of Law, but recognise that occasionally the Law is an Ass. Catholic and Protestant, I try and do a bit for Church and Country while flitting between Sligo, Fermanagh and Dublin.

Latest comments from Neville Bagnall (see all)

Neville Bagnall has commented 96 times (16 in the last month).

1. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
   on 18 May 2012 at 6:41 pm

   To clarify: since the Fiscal Treaty is not an EU Treaty, it’s not part of the European acquis and withdrawal from it is not the same as withdrawal from the EU. Its importance to the Eurozone on the other hand…

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2. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
   on 18 May 2012 at 6:27 pm

   Alias:
   Ronan Lyons is spinning the line that national debt is the same thing as a derogation of sovereignty.

   It is. If I depend on an external actor, I’m not independent.

   It doesn’t matter whether its the EU or a bunch of bankers, if the state finds itself unable to carry on without financial support, its not economically sovereign. If borrowing is done because its the most cost effective way of investing, that’s one thing. If its done out of necessity that’s entirely different.

   Sovereignty has to be de facto as well as de jure.

   Re: withdrawal, I was referring to the Fiscal Treaty, not the EU. But yes, the Lisbon Treaty has an EU withdrawal procedure and as part of our Constitutional Law, that would be the obvious approach to take.

   However, our Constitutional Law is subservient to the People. The People are Sovereign, not the Constitution. If we voted in a referendum to modify the Constitution to make all EU law invalid (or subservient) within the state, it would be. No arguments.

   Its just that doing that would have consequences. The least of which would be that we would no longer be in the EU or the EEA. We can become de jure an icon of pristine Sovereignty whenever we want. But could we de facto back it up? It didn’t work out so well in the 30′s.

   Ireland has never proven able to fulfill the political promise encapusated in the name Sinn Féin. I’ve never understood why we’d want to try. Nationhood and Statehood, yes; Insular Nationalism, no.

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3. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
   on 18 May 2012 at 5:39 pm

   wee buns – The treaty does allow for “exceptional circumstances”

   “exceptional circumstances” refers to the case of an unusual event outside the control of the Contracting Party concerned which has a major impact on the financial position of the general government or to periods of severe economic downturn as set out in the revised Stability and Growth Pact, provided that the temporary deviation of the Contracting Party concerned does not endanger fiscal sustainability in the medium-term.

   But if it had been in place before 2008, as best I can tell, the main effects would have been:

   1) We’d have had to get the agreement of the other states that the collapse of the property market and resultant hole in our budget was an “exceptional circumstance”. As a result the Troika would have come in earlier.

   2) We wouldn’t have been able to extend the bank guarantee and recapitalise the banks without getting the agreement of the other states. As a result the Troika would have come in earlier.

   Other than that I’m hard pressed to see what we’d have done differently.

   The property bubble is what made any sort of debt financed stimulus unavailable to us.

   However, given that we are a small open peripheral economy, our deficit/surplus swings tend to be larger than for the bigger core states. (“When the UK/US/EU catches a cold, we get pneumonia”)

   Given that, if we are to live with the treaty long term we will have to develop automatic stabilisers (sovereign wealth fund, infrastructural and/or social investment banks) that can respond to the downturn without affecting the budgetary or debt status of the state.

   We need a regular flu jab. Doing that requires longer term thinking and higher taxes & investment than some might argue for.

   If we want to keep our economic sovereignty in future we have to plan out how to do it and develop a cross party consensus around it similar to that enjoyed by our corporation tax policy.

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4. Comment on Euro crisis: “Tis agoreuein bouletai?”
   on 18 May 2012 at 9:49 am

   Underwriting Greek debt through Eurobonds isn’t really the issue though, is it?

   The issue is Fiscal Transfer.

   If we’re saying that the Greeks will never have an internally balanced budget, how much more should be transferred as annual grants/budgetary aid on top of existing EU funds like the Cohesion Fund?

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5. Comment on Euro crisis: “Tis agoreuein bouletai?”
   on 18 May 2012 at 9:20 am

   See also:
   German finance minister calls for directly elected EU president
   http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2012/0518/1224316280646.html

   I’d love to see it but I don’t think it’ll happen.

   The European Council is a bit like a corporate version of a late-medieval monarch. Used to having the “Right of Kings” to executive power.

   In the UK, the King was forced to move from appointing his own Prime Minister to do his bidding to accepting the nominee of Parliament (with a few rare exceptions).

   Perhaps its time that the European Parliament proposed the President of the Commission (at least) from among its members (who would resign as an MEP obviously).

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6. Comment on Euro crisis: “Tis agoreuein bouletai?”
   on 18 May 2012 at 8:56 am

   The extended guarantee came before the Troika but contributed to the Troika becoming inevitable.
   http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3aac1ede-baa8-11df-b73d-00144feab49a.html#axzz1vCohUb9F

   Ireland is committed to a course and (mostly) hitting its targets. That and its economic insignificance removes it from the discourse.

   Nevertheless, the debt burden remains a long term issue that will have to be addressed at some point, my preference (and I think the only logical option) being when we could balance our budget.

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7. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
   on 18 May 2012 at 8:28 am

   The key to interpreting Article 29 of the Constitution I believe is the distinction between the words shall and may.

   That and Section 4, subsection 1°.

   The executive power of the State in or in connection with its external relations shall in accordance with Article 28 of this Constitution be exercised by or on the authority of the Government.

   Article 28 sets out the limits of the authority of the Government.

   But again, IANAL.

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8. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
   on 18 May 2012 at 8:13 am

   Oh, and by the way, it could even be legal to withdraw without another referendum. But IANAL.

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9. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
   on 18 May 2012 at 7:54 am

   The people are Sovereign. We can change our constitution any time we want. With two caveats.

   First we’d have to elect a government that would pass a Referendum Bill to withdraw.

   Secondly, withdrawing from any international treaty (or any other contract for that matter) usually has consequences. Political/relational and possibly financial.

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10. Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
    on 17 May 2012 at 7:53 pm

    Ronan Lyons has given us a decision tree:

    http://www.ronanlyons.com/2012/05/17/the-austerity-games-irelands-fiscal-treaty-referendum-redux/

    Not much to disagree with there from where I sit.

    I’m a big fan of Choice. And of Dissent. But sometimes, when all is said and done, the alternative on offer may simply not be credible.

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