Flint admits: I haven't read Lisbon Treaty

THE Minister for Europe has caused uproar by admitting she did not read the highly controversial Lisbon Treaty.

Caroline Flint's confession came after she was challenged by her Tory shadow Mark Francois during a Commons committee on the impact of the treaty. Ms Flint said: "I have read some of it but not all of it." As MPs gasped she added: "I have been briefed on some of it."

Critics said it was all the more extraordinary because Ms Flint has repeatedly insisted that the Treaty was a good deal for Britain.

A Foreign Office spokesman tried to smooth over the gaffe by saying Ms Flint was "fully conversant" with the treaty. Asked if Foreign Secretary David Miliband had read it, the spokesman said he was also fully conversant with it and refused to be drawn further. A political aide to Ms Flint said she had now read the entire treaty, and said the Tories were "obsessing" about the treaty to divert attention from their own EU policies that would "drag Britain to the fringes".

Mr Francois said she had been "wonderfully honest" but inept. "It's not every day someone will admit they haven't read the most important document for their job," he said.