Polish Parliament clears EU Treaty bill

The Polish Senate today (2 April) followed the lower house of Parliament in approving a bill to ratify the Lisbon Treaty, ending weeks of dispute between Prime Minister Donald Tusk and the nationalist opposition led by the Kaczynski twins.

The ratification bill passed both chambers by overwhelming majority, with 74 out of 97 senators and 384 out of 452 deputies voting in its favour.

The bill will now be sent to the president, Lech Kaczynski, who said he would ratify the bill “with the greatest pleasure”.

Poland will then become the seventh EU country to ratify the Treaty, after Hungary, Slovenia, Malta, Romania, France and Bulgaria.

Commission President José Manuel Barroso welcomed this decision, saying this vote “symbolises Poland’s confidence in our common European project, and shows that she wants to play an active part in building a Europe, which is strong, democratic and efficient”. 

A parliamentary majority in favour of the Lisbon Treaty seemed uncertain after Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the president’s twin brother and current leader of the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party had insisted on adding a preamble to the ratification bill that would guarantee Poland’s sovereignty over the EU on major decisions.

Under an agreement announced on Sunday (30 March), the bill was voted upon along with an accompanying resolution containing references to Poland’s sovereignty. The deal also included Tusk’s promise to start working on a new division of powers between the president, government and parliament.

Faced with a possible withdrawal of support by the opposition, Tusk had signalled his intention to call a referendum to ratify the Treaty.

Now, Ireland remains the only country certain to hold a referendum in a vote scheduled in June. But the outcome there remains uncertain, with a recent poll revealing that less than half of Irish citizens are likely to back the text (EURACTIV 3/03/07).

Read more with Euractiv

Poland strikes deal on EU Treaty ratification

The government and the nationalist opposition have struck an agreement on the EU's Lisbon Treaty, ending a dispute that threatened to upset Poland's ratification of a text which the nationalists had fought hard to secure at a summit last year.