Article 133 has them shook

national | miscellaneous | news report Friday October 04, 2002 17:31 by C.

We can keep the pressure on tonight

Tonights forum on Europe, in the mansion house at 7pm, could finally be interesting. Brendan Howlin and David Beggs telling us how Nice is good for workers. But now that the article 133 cat is out of the bag, they're finally having to debate.

In todays IT David Beggs argued that Mick O'Reilly, sacked ATGWU leader was wrong to warn of the dangers of Article 133. By misinterpreting the original article and showing the usual ignorance of article 133 he focussed on QMV and the derogation for health and education - hoping to use the standard wto defences that Mary Harney already rolled out.

All standard FUD - except David Beggs is hte president of ICTU and should have a bit more sense. And he usually does. In February he went to the forum on europe and talked about article 133 - this time giving out how there was no parliamentary procedure involved, unlike the US.

"But let me tell you something. Unlike the US Congress, the European Parliament has no right of assent at the end. I think we should do that because it legitimises any outcome by a small degree. I don’t exaggerate, but there should be a Parliamentary procedure. But I don’t make the point merely or only—not merely, but only—for a constitutional or institutional reason."

So try and get along to the forum tonight - and ask David Beggs why did he change his mind - and which time was he wrong: last February in the forum or today in the Irish times.