The government, led by the Kaczynskitwins' conservative party Law and Justice (PiS), had previously opposed the constitutional treaty on the grounds that the voting method it contained a double majority system based on the number of countries and their population size would favour larger countries such as France and Germany at the expense of medium-sized countries such as Poland.
Poland's first years as an EU member saw a string of political crises as Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, identical twins, shored up their conservative coalition government with radical nationalists and populists.