EU consensus needed to scrap UK vote

THE British vote on the European constitution can only be scrapped with the agreement of other European Union leaders, Downing Street admitted yesterday.

Many European leaders are determined to press ahead with the constitution project, despite today’s expected No vote in the Netherlands and Sunday’s resounding French rejection, which yesterday prompted the resignation of Jean-Pierre Raffarin as French prime minister.

Despite the British government’s private hope that the treaty will be now scrapped, ministers are keen not to be seen to be trying to do away with it.

"Europe proceeds by consensus," Tony Blair’s official spokesman said yesterday. Asked if the government was prepared to declare the treaty dead, he insisted that only the heads of the 25 EU governments could do that: "The proper forum for that is the EU Council."

That means the question of a UK referendum is unlikely to be answered until a Brussels summit starting 16 June.

Reflecting the more cautious position, Downing Street also declined to back Neil Kinnock when he declared there was now no point in a British referendum - even though the former Labour leader was expressing the private hopes of government insiders.

Officially, the government position is that there will be a referendum in Britain if there is a valid constitution on which to vote. Mr Blair’s spokesman admitted that despite the French ‘Non’, the constitution remains legally valid. The spokesman also played down suggestions that Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, will use a Commons statement on Monday to suspend the legislation that would allow a British referendum. Mr Straw’s statement, he said, would be "more of an update" than a substantial change of policy.

In the aftermath of the referendum defeat, Jacques Chirac, the French president, yesterday appointed his loyal lieutenant Dominique de Villepin as prime minister. Mr de Villepin, who as France’s foreign minister during the Iraq war was the country’s eloquent voice against a US-led invasion before becoming interior minister last year, replaces Mr Raffarin, whose unpopularity was widely believed to have contributed to voters’ decisive rejection of the EU charter.

The president’s arch-rival, Nicolas Sarkozy, who heads Mr Chirac’s governing centre-right UMP party, will replace Mr de Villepin in the interior ministry. Mr Sarkozy was a popular interior minister for two years until April 2004 when he was forced to resign by Mr Chirac in order to take over as UMP head.

That Mr Chirac has now had to reintegrate his enemy back into his government, while allowing him to retain such a powerful position in the UMP, is testament to how much the president’s position has been weakened by Sunday’s result.