Caroline Simons to sue John McGuirk Irish Times
UNSUCCESSFUL LIBERTAS candidate for Dublin Caroline Simons sent a legal letter to Declan Ganley’s spokesman the day after the European elections accusing the spokesman of defaming her.
Ms Simons’s complaint related to a press release issued to the media in her name describing an international Jewish organisation, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, as “beneath contempt”.
The release was prompted by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre’s claim that some Libertas candidates around Europe were “known anti-Semites, homophobes and anti-migrant racists”.
Ms Simons’s letter to John McGuirk, seen by The Irish Times , was dated June 6th.
This was after Mr Ganley had announced Libertas would “ally itself” with the Wiesenthal Centre to fight anti-Semitism in the European Parliament and Libertas had issued a retraction of the original statement in Ms Simons’s name.
On June 1st, a statement from the Wiesenthal centre claimed “extremist” parties and individuals were “reportedly affiliated to the Libertas bloc, founded in 2006 by the Irish-based magnate, Declan Ganley, in order to combat the Lisbon Treaty on European integration”.
Referring to Libertas candidates across Europe, the Wiesenthal centre said: “Some of those standing are known anti-Semites, homophobes and anti-migrant racists.”
A responding statement issued by Libertas in Ms Simons’s name described the Wiesenthal centre as “beneath contempt”.
The statement said it had been only a matter of time before “the establishment got so desperate” that it resorted to calling Libertas Nazis. “The only surprise here is that we had to wait so long before they could find a willing idiot to come and say it.” The statement was dated June 2nd but released on the 3rd.
Later the same day, Mr Ganley announced that Libertas would “ally itself” with the centre “in a joint commitment to defend against, and actively fight, racism and anti-Semitism within the European Parliament and other European Institutions”.
Libertas’s press office said it later issued another statement saying the earlier release attributed to Ms Simons had been issued in error and had not been approved. Ms Simons told The Irish Times that “a number” of press releases were issued in her name without her knowledge during the recent campaign.
She said she sent an e-mail to media outlets on June 3rd, signed by Mr Ganley and herself, saying: “A statement was released earlier today by a member of the Irish Libertas staff which contained untruths.” Ms Simons said she sent an e-mail to the RTÉ newsdesk on June 6th, saying: “The release made by a Libertas staff member was made without Ms Simons’ knowledge or authority and comments ascribed to her were never said and are untrue.”
Mr McGuirk said yesterday: “I’m very disappointed that a candidate who didn’t perform particularly well in the election would choose to embarrass herself like this.”
The subsequent letter from Ms Simons’s solicitor to Mr McGuirk said the original statement issued on her behalf was defamatory.
Ms Simons’s solicitor had instructed Mr McGuirk to issue a new statement to the media outlets that had received the original release, saying Ms Simons was “in fact an ardent supporter” of the Wiesenthal centre and its causes
Libertas refused use of Liberty Hall
HARRY McGEE, Political StaffTHE LAUNCH of Libertas’ European election campaign for the Dublin constituency was hit last night by a row with trade union Siptu over its refusal to allow the use of Liberty Hall, its headquarters, for the announcement.
Libertas said yesterday it had booked a room in Liberty Hall five weeks ago for the launch of the campaign of its Dublin candidate, Caroline Simons.
However, Siptu informed the party yesterday that it could not use the room. Yesterday afternoon, Libertas switched the venue to the nearby Wynn’s Hotel for the launch. When contacted, Siptu cited two grounds for its refusal: the use of what it said was “subterfuge” when the booking of the room was made; and because it did not agree with its policies.
The union said the room was booked by a person who was a Siptu shop steward, but who gave no indication that it would be used by Libertas for the launch of Ms Simons’s campaign.
If it had known the purpose of the meeting, permission would never have been granted. “We suspect that this was a stunt from the beginning,” said a spokesman.
For its part, Libertas said that the booking had been open and had been made some weeks previously. “This extraordinary and last-minute U-turn by the authorities at Liberty Hall raises very interesting questions. Caroline Simons spent a large portion of her career working with the trade union movement to secure equality for women. She adopted the same position on the Lisbon Treaty as an overwhelming majority of trade union members,” said Libertas spokesman John McGuirk.
Speaking at the launch, Ms Simons, a Dublin solicitor with five young daughters, claimed EU interference in Ireland’s corporate tax regime represented the greatest threat to Ireland’s independence.
She said that this threat was real, quoting comments made by an aide of German chancellor Angela Merkel earlier this year, who said that Ireland’s corporate tax rate needed to be revisited.
Ms Simons was introduced to an audience of some 70 people by Libertas East candidate Raymond O’Malley.
Ms Simons criticised the EU which she said created 80 per cent of Ireland’s laws and costs €130 billion each year.
She said Libertas was not anti-European, but that all its candidates throughout Europe were “united in one goal to make the EU closer to and accountable to its citizens”.
She criticised what she portrayed as wasteful spending by an institution where “decisions are taken behind closed doors”.
She claimed Brussels was disconnected from the very tough times that were being encountered everywhere. She said EU institutions had provided swimming pools, health spas, free education and exclusive schools for itself.
“What do we get here? The bill,” she said.
The four sitting MEPs in Dublin are Eoin Ryan (Fianna Fail); Gay Mitchell (Fine Gael); Proinsias De Rossa (Labour); and Mary Lou McDonald (Sinn Féin). Deirdre de Búrca (Green Party) and Joe Higgins (Socialist Party) have also declared they will be candidates.
Caroline Simons (left):Prospective Libertas candidate for Dublin and former
Libertas to pin hopes on a pro-Catholic agenda
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Libertas, the anti-Lisbon Treaty group founded by Declan Ganley, is to launch its Irish campaign for the European Parliament eletions later this month and will bring candidates from all over Europe together in Rome at the end of March.
The organisation will unveil its Irish candidates, expected to include Ganley himself in the North West (Connacht-Ulster) constituency, in the coming weeks, his spokesman said last week. A conference in Rome on March 25 will mark the beginning of a pan-European campaign.
The Brussels organisation is being largely run by the former Danish MEP Jens-Peter Bonde, a long-time critic of further European integration. The group has also hired Robin Matthews, a former British army communications officer,and is advertising for interns on its website. A spokesman said that staff numbers would exceed 100 shortly.
Solicitor Caroline Simons, who campaigned against the Lisbon treaty with Libertas, is expected to be the newgroup’s candidate in Dublin. Libertas has promised a high profile personality in Leinster, and may yet stand a candidate in Munster.
The group’s spokesman acknowledged that sitting MEP Kathy Sinnott ‘‘agrees with us on 99 per cent of the issues’’. Ganley has not officially confirmed that he will run in the North West constituency, but his aides have acknowledged that it would be an enormous climb down for him to back out at this stage. ‘‘He can’t not run. But he’s an all-or-nothing guy,” said one.
The alliance with Sinnott, the inclusion of Simons, and Ganley’s speech to a meeting of Catholic groups last weekend in Ballaghaderreen, Co Roscommon, in which he spoke of his opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage and quoted approvingly from Pope Benedict XVI, signified a broadening of the Libertas identity from a single issue group campaigning against the Lisbon Treaty. Though she came to prominence as a disabilities campaigner, Sinnott has strong antiabortion views, while Simons is a former spokeswoman for the prolife campaign.
But evolving a distinctive policy identity in an organisation that has ambitions to stretch across Europe won’t be easy. ‘‘The speech that Declan gave last week,” said an aide about his remarks to the Catholic groups, ‘‘that might serve him well in the west of Ireland and Poland. But we can’t have candidates saying that sort of thing in the Czech Republic or Sweden.”
The evolution of a coherent Libertas identity before the European elections faces other challenges, too.
Ganley has insistently denied being a Eurosceptic or in any way anti-European, but he has allied himself to elements in some European countries that are not just Eurosceptics, but Euro haters. It’s difficult, for example, to characterizes the Czech president Vaclav Klaus - whom Ganley has met and feted - in any other way.
Whatever about opposition to the Lisbon Treaty, outright opposition to the European project - or an alliance with those who are so opposed - will be a tough sell in Ireland. By most measures - the referendum result aside - Ireland is one of the most pro-European countries in the union.
However, Ganley has chosen to run in that part of Ireland in which feelings towards the EU project are the least warm.
According to detailed research carried out by RedC for The Sunday Business Post after the Lisbon Treaty referendum (as part of a project with Trinity College), the Connacht -Ulster region was significantly less pro-Lisbon and less pro-European than the rest of the country.
For example, asked whether they agreed that Ireland should ‘‘do all it could to unite fully with the EU,” or if Ireland should ‘‘do all it can to protect its independence from the EU’’, voters in Connacht-Ulster came down 48-46 in favour of independence. Dublin, by contrast, favoured uniting with Europe by a margin of 60-36 per cent.
This finding is reflected across the research. Some 48 per cent in Connacht-Ulster see themselves as ‘‘Irish only’’; 44 per cent as ‘‘Irish and European’’. In Dublin, 54 per cent say they are ‘‘Irish and European’’.
Some 30 per cent of people in the West and North-West don’t expect Ireland to benefit from the EU in the future.
In the actual referendum, all the constituencies in Connacht-Ulster counties voted No. The highest number of No votes was in Mayo, which delivered 30,000 votes against Lisbon, with less than 19,000 in favour.
This sentiment has endured in the region. Last month’s poll showed that, while national opinion had swung once again behind the Lisbon Treaty, the margin was slimmest in Connacht-Ulster. While the Yes vote leads by 74-26 in Dublin, the margin in the West and North West was just 54-46.
On issues such as abortion there is also a distinct difference between Connacht-Ulster and the rest of the country. When questioned, 51 per cent of people in the region said abortion should never be allowed in Ireland. In Dublin, the number is just 36 per cent. Ganley’s recently advertised anti-abortion views will not hurt him in this constituency.
None the less, winning a seat will be a very tall order for Ganley. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael won more than half of the vote between them at the 2004 European elections in the constituency, while the most recent Red C monthly tracking poll showed the two parties attracting the support of 60 per cent of voters there.
So, one seat each for the two main parties is probably inevitable, meaning Ganley will need to target the seat of Independent MEP Marian Harkin. She is a strong local performer with a network of support throughout the constituency, and will be difficult to shift. Sinn Féin also enjoys strong support, and took 65,000 votes in 2004.
Ganley’s past criticism of the Common Agricultural Policy may not be palatable for many rural voters. He will face continuing questions about the funding of the organisation, questions he has been unable to answer with any degree of consistency since the organisation was founded.
Another difficulty for Ganley is that the political landscape has shifted so wildly since the first referendum. It is hard to predict what effect this will have on the European elections.
At one level, there is almost certain to be massive anti-government sentiment among voters. However, whether this translates into support for a candidate who favours a different relationship with the EU is another question entirely.
The most recent tracking poll for this newspaper a fortnight ago showed political support had swung in favour of the Lisbon Treaty, including among those who voted against it the last time.
If the worsening recession is pushing voters towards the perceived protection of the EU, then it will make it more difficult for Ganley.
Defeat in the European elections would undermine his opposition to Lisbon in any subsequent referendum. Last year’s referendum result was a stunning success for Ganley. But he is discovering that in politics, success just brings a whole new set of problems.
Call for Pope not to meet Ganely before EU Elections and Lisbon 2
Libertas? Space Cadets?
“I am thinking about it,” she said.
In a speech to be delivered tonight at Trinity College Dublin in response to former French president Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, Ms Simons describes herself as “somebody seriously thinking about putting herself before the electorate”
Abortion Confused? – Libertas and Ganley want you to be.
During last year’s Referendum campaign a Libertas leaflet said "The
Ganley tried to reverse that position on TV3 on Sunday 18 May, 2008. He told Ursula Halligan on Ireland's TV3 that Libertas had no position in relation to abortion.
On 3 June, 2008 the Irish Independent reported Libertas spokesperson Caroline Simons as saying, truthfully, that the Lisbon Treaty would not give the European Union influence over abortion laws in this country. She elaborated: "In relation to the abortion issue, there is, as you know, since the
Libertas spokesperson Caroline Simons is legal advisor to Ireland's Pro Life Campaign
Simmons is right the Protocol which has the same binding effect as the Treaty itself reads “Nothing in the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe or in the Treaties or Acts modifying or supplementing it shall affect the application in
Now Ganley is reversing his position again, again spreading confusion and trying to deceive people.
The Irish Times today reports him as telling a conference in Ballaghaderreen, Co Roscommon, at the weekend which was organised by the Catholic John Paul II Society and co-hosted by the pro-life Human Life International group that any guarantees given by the EU on social and ethical issues “were not worth the paper they are written on”, where the European Court of Justice was concerned and that: “the laws of the union have primacy over the laws of any member state . . . If there is a conflict, union law rules.”
Ignoring for the moment that Ganley is criticising something that he hasn’t seen and that hasn’t yet been finalised, his suggestion that ‘the laws of the union have primacy over the laws of any member state‘ is untrue in the matter of abortion.
The fact that this line is untrue was recognised by MR JUSTICE IARFHLAITH O’NEILL. Chairman of the Referendum Commission who told a Press Briefing, on Wednesday 4th June 2008
“In regard to abortion, Protocol No. 35 to the Treaty of Lisbon on Article 40.3.3 of the Constitution of Ireland states that nothing in the Treaties or in the Treaties or Acts modifying or supplementing those Treaties, shall affect the application in Ireland of Article 40.3.3 of the Constitution of Ireland.
Protocols have full legal force – they have the same legal status as an Article of the Treaties. This Protocol is EU law and it explicitly excludes Article 40.3.3 of the Irish Constitution from any other EU law.
This means
If Ganley won’t listen to the opinion of a High Court Judge who has studied the issue in detail, perhaps he would listen to the in house Libertas legal expert. The reality is of course that he is less interested in facts – his real aim is confusion.
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