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The Irish foreign minister has said at a meeting in Brussels that the Irish government has not taken a decision on holding another Lisbon Treaty referendum. I'm sure that is technically true. But it's not the buzz around town, nor was it the thrust of his speech and the question and answer session afterwards.

Micheal Martin was speaking at an event organised by the . He said the Irish government was in the midst of an intensive set of negotiations that would lead to a "roadmap" suggesting a way forward that both respected the results of the No vote in the early summer and what he called "the widespread desire across Europe to see the treaty come into effect". I travel quite a lot around Europe and it never strikes me as that widespread a desire, so I guess he means the politicians of other European countries. But he said he didn't feel bullied by them.

I am told that the plan is that by the end of this week's summit the Irish government will declare that it intends to ratify the Lisbon Treaty by this time next year. In return other countries will agree to legally binding statements making it clear the treaty does not affect three main areas of concern to No voters: abortion, neutrality and taxation.

For wonks, this would be a "decision" which avoids reopening ratifying Lisbon in other countries. It would be turned into a legally binding "protocol" later, probably bolted onto the treaty that would be needed when Croatia joins the EU.

There would also be an agreement to address a fourth main worry - the potential loss of influence through the rotating loss of a commissioner. If the Lisbon Treaty was in place, the plan to slim down the commission could be killed off if all 27 countries agreed. At the moment this is quite a serious sticking point because Belgium and Luxembourg don't like it.

By Friday night, if he's very lucky and doesn't face any hard ball interviews, the Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen may not actually be made to utter the words "second referendum", but this is what it is all about. Mr Martin said: "Does it require a second referendum? I am not a constitutional lawyer, there are potentially other ways, fraught with risks, that one could perhaps pursue, other than a referendum, but when we looked at this initially, the clear advice at the time was that it required a referendum and that's why we had one earlier this year. So I think that's ultimately the way, if certain things were agreed, one would have to go."

I asked him how he would answer those who said that it would be an insult to ask people to vote again. "In a democracy I don't believe it is ever an insult to go to the people to seek a decision. That's it, and I firmly believe that."

Mr Martin said the most important thing was to listen to the people. His aim was to find a way to "reconcile the decision of the people with the overall desire of the people to play an active role in the European Union".

There is clearly a belief by the Irish government that the Irish are not against the EU, not against its direction of travel, and not against the general thrust of the treaty.

That may turn out to be true, but it's a heck of a risk to take.

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