The Lisbon Treaty establishes or constitutes a legally new European Union, with its own full legal personality for the first time (Art.47 TEU) and a unified constitutional structure, which would take over and replace the European Community that we are currently members of and have been since 1973. This post-Lisbon EU would be constitutionally very different from the European Union that we are currently members of, which was established by the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht. This important constitutional change is evident from the first sentence of the Constitutional Amendment which the Irish people are being asked to insert into the Irish Constitution. This would permit the State 'to be a member of the European Union established by virtue of that Treaty', (i.e. the Treaty of Lisbon - not the Treaty of Maastricht). The mandate specified a number of other ways in which the Lisbon Treaty would differ from the Constitution but, otherwise, it would incorporate almost all the other innovations proposed in the European Constitution. The final text of the Treaty drawn up by the IGC was approved in the margins of the informal European Council in Lisbon on 18-19 October 2007 and signed on behalf of the Member States on 13 December 2007. The signing of the Treaty will be followed by ratification processes in all 27 countries. The Lisbon Treaty will not come into force unless and until it is ratified by all 27 Member States. Contrary to popular belief there are still other states except Ireland who have still not fully ratified the Lisbon Treaty. One country which is often said to have ratified the treaty but actually and surprisingly has not is Germany. Other countries yet to ratify the Lisbon Treaty are Poland and the Czech Republic.