Irish referendum on the Lisbon Treaty

Twenty-eighth Amendment of the Constitution Bill 2008

To permit the state to ratify the Treaty of Lisbon

Location

Date

12 June 2008

Results
	Votes	%
Yes	752,451	7001466000000000000♠46.60%
No	862,415	7001534000000000000♠53.40%
Valid votes	1,614,866	7001996200000000000♠99.62%
Invalid or blank votes	6,171	6999380000000000000♠0.38%
Total votes	1,621,037	100.00%
Registered voters/turnout	3,051,278	7001531300000000000♠53.13%

Results by constituency

Yes No

The Twenty-eighth Amendment of the Constitution Bill 2008 (bill no. 14 of 2008) was a proposed amendment to the Constitution of Ireland that was put to a referendum in 2008 (the first Lisbon referendum). The purpose of the proposed amendment was to allow the state to ratify the Treaty of Lisbon of the European Union.

The amendment was rejected by voters on 12 June 2008 by a margin of 53.4% to 46.6%, with a turnout of 53.1%. The treaty had been intended to enter into force on 1 January 2009, but had to be delayed following the Irish rejection. However, the Lisbon treaty was approved by Irish voters when the Twenty-eighth Amendment of the constitution was approved in the second Lisbon referendum, held in October 2009.

The Treaty of Lisbon was signed by the member states of the European Union on 13 December 2007. It was in large part of a revision of the text of the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe after its rejection in referendums in France in May 2005 and in the Netherlands in June 2005. The Treaty of Lisbon preserved most of the content of the Constitution, especially the new rules on the functioning of the European Institutions, but gives up any symbolic or terminologic reference to a Constitution. (See Treaty of Lisbon compared to the European Constitution.)

Because of the decision of the Supreme Court in Crotty v. An Taoiseach (1987), an amendment to the Constitution was required before it could be ratified by Ireland. Ireland was the only one of the then 15 EU member states to put the Treaty to the people in a referendum. Ratification of the Treaty in all other member states was decided upon by national parliaments alone.

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