No vote on EU Constitution for Britain

I missed this report in the Daily Mail, linked here, when it appeared last week. Main points are the following:

The British public could be denied a say over the European Constitution, Downing Street has suggested.

Officials said it was not necessary to hold a referendum over the issue.

No 10's apparent surrender could mean Britain giving up voting powers and the right to veto crucial areas of EU policy....

.....a spokesman admitted that a pared-down document could be nodded through by MPs to make an enlarged EU work more effectively. He added: "We think the best European Constitution is a simple constitution.

"The result of a simple constitution would be that we would not have to hold a referendum."

Europe Minister Geoff Hoon is known to be sympathetic to French presidential candidate Nicolas Sarkozy's plan for a "mini constitution" that would still contain many of the elements rejected by Dutch and French voters in 2005.

This would include a permanent EU president, permanent foreign minister and a massive extension of majority voting in areas such as justice and home affairs and give the EU the right to sign treaties for the first time in history.