Hilary White  Date: 30 September 2009

On Friday this week, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) will vote on a pro-abortion report that says that all states should offer abortion by 2015.

Ironically, at the same time as Irish voters are being told by their government that there is no threat from the European Union and the Lisbon Treaty to their constitutional protections of the right to life, the PACE Committee of Ministers is being encouraged to start the development of a European Convention "to achieve universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights by 2015."

The report that PACE will be considering is entitled "Fifteen years since the International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action."

Prof Ray Kinsella Date: 30 September 2009

The outcome of the second Irish referendum on the EU Lisbon Treaty, which is being held on Friday, will affect the trajectory of global economics and politics. The first time, in June 2008, the treaty was rejected—notwithstanding the urgings of the mainstream political parties—by a surprisingly large majority of the people, 54% to 47%.

This time around, the Irish government is playing on the “fear factor.” Ireland’s economy is in intensive care, suffering from largely self-inflicted wounds. The economy will contract by 10% this year. A construction-led binge, facilitated by credit institutions as well as by weak regulatory oversight, has come to a juddering halt. Unemployment has escalated beyond all expectations and affects every family and every business in the country. The bogeymen conjured up by the government include the assertions and innuendo that, for example, Ireland will be ”pushed out” or “left behind” in Europe in the event of a No vote. There are vague mutterings that Ireland will lose the good will of the European political establishment.

Wall Street Journal Date:16 September 2009

Irish voters are due to vote again on the European Union's Lisbon Treaty in two weeks, and the campaigns for and against the accord have only just begun in earnest. The latest polls suggest that the Irish are leaning toward ratification, but the Irish government, to judge by its stridency, is taking nothing for granted.

It is a measure of the desperation of the supporters of the treaty that they have resorted to patent absurdities in their efforts to secure a Yes vote from the Irish people the second time around. Last Friday, Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan told a press conference that "a 'No' vote will signal to the rest of the world that Ireland has retreated into economic isolation." This in turn would lead to capital flight from Ireland and higher interest rates and borrowing costs for the Irish economy.