Like a bad smell, the European Constitution keeps coming back.

Wait! No! It's not the EU constitution, it's an amending treaty. It different. It's difference is that the EU won't have an official flag or anthem, the rest is the same though. Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, who wrote this piece of garbage has said that the politicos are pushing essentially the same document that was decisively rejected by France and The Nederlands two years ago. Now Blair says that because it is an amending treaty, he doesn't see the need to honour his commitment to a referendum (which he would lose) and instead will ratify it through parliament. I say it's outrageous.

When Margaret Beckett, the foreign secretary, sits down for dinner tonight in Luxembourg with her 26 European Union colleagues, she will fire Britain’s opening shot in what promises to be a bitter week-long battle over the future of Europe.

The dinner, in a dull conference centre, will not be the most glamorous event Beckett has attended, and it could be one of her last: she is not expected to survive in the position once Gordon Brown takes over as prime minister on June 27.

But the meal for foreign ministers marks the unofficial start of this week’s EU summit (things officially get under way in Brussels on Thursday) and on the table is a reheated version of the European constitution proposed three years ago and scuppered by French and Dutch voters 12 months later.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle1942929.ece

Downing Street has indicated the treaty that emerges from next week's EU summit will not be put to a referendum.

Tony Blair promised a public vote on the EU constitution in 2004 - before it was rejected by France and Holland.

Number 10 said the document expected to be agreed next week would be an "amending" treaty rather than a "constitutional" treaty.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6756331.stm

Oh and another thing. Nicolas Sarkozy, the new French president, has floated the idea that Mr Blair could become the EU’s first permanent president. No carrot there then!

Older posters will remember I predicted this when France and The Nederlands rejected the proposal. I should have been a palm reader.