Frankrijk houdt referendum over Europese Grondwet in 2005 (en)

French President Jacques Chirac on Wednesday announced that his country will have a referendum on the Constitution.

During the traditional Bastille Day speech, Mr Chirac said that he would organise a referendum in the second half of next year.

"In the years to come, all the countries will have to ratify it. The French are directly concerned, and therefore will be directly consulted. There will be a referendum", the president said in a television interview.

Mr Chirac's announcement means that two of the largest member states (the UK and France) will be consulting the people on the recently-agreed treaty.

They join other member states such as Ireland, Denmark, Luxembourg, the Czech Republic, Portugal, the Netherlands, Spain and the Czech Republic.

All 25 member states have to ratify the Constitution for it to enter into force - from the date of signing (29 October), two years have been allocated for ratification procedure.

A non-binding text has been attached to the Constitution.

This text suggests that if 4/5 of member states have ratified the text after two years, and some states still have not, then EU leaders will discuss the matter.

The big headache will come if one of the large member states rejects the text - when a small country (Ireland) rejected the Nice Treaty, the question was put to the voters a second time.

In 1992, France only just managed to squeeze through the Maastricht Treaty with 50.95% voting in favour.