`THE PEOPLE` 1 - EUROPE 0

Well done, Eire. Take a bow. The game may not be over but the people have gone ahead against the run of play with a stunning goal scored deep into injury time.

Perhaps more soberingly, it strikes me as revealing that, when `the people` are reluctantly given their first chance to actually have a vote on the provisions of the Lisbon Treaty....they reject it. It begs the question, of course, as to what the verdict of the rest of `the people` might have been across the rest of Europe if they had been given the chance to express their opinions too. The outcome in France and Holland might be predictable, as they had already rejected the original constituion and they would probably have been joined by the majority of voters in Britain had Gordon Brown lived up to his pledge to hold a referendum rather than running away from it, being clearly terrified of the probable outcome.

So, what happens now? I feel a bit sorry for Irish Prime Minister, Brian Cowen, who is new to the job, campaigned for a `yes` vote and is now facing the prospect of a hard time when he meets his European counterparts next week. Small wonder he looks trapped in the headlights:-

The Life of Brian

The reaction of the arrogant, self-serving `leaders` of the European Union is itself predictable. They will find it impossible to work out what `no` really means and if they do understand it, then they will probably try to ignore it and carry on with their `project` anyway. And nothing will bring them and all they stand for into greater disrepute than ignoring the will of the few `people` who have had the opportunity to express their opinion on the bureaucratic, remote, largely unelected elite who presume to speak and act for 500million others.

The real truth is that, if they continue to ignore verdicts like the one just delivered by the good folk of Eire, the Brussels elite will show yet again their determination to compromise democracy for their own ends.....and that is something `the people` might just find intolerable, whether they are asked for their opinion or not.