YP Letters: Time Britain stopped digging itself into a hole over the EU

ON June 24, 2016, the country awoke to the results of a referendum held the previous day to the news that the majority of voters in this ‘United Kingdom’ of ours had voted to leave the European Union.

Yet here we are almost three years later with our elected politicians still fighting amongst themselves. The ‘Remainers’ continue doing all in their power to thwart those who had the gall to vote ‘Leave’, and the ‘Leavers’ appear simply unable to agree between themselves about how we should leave.

All this confusion is being further manipulated by those in all parties who see this as their opportunity to stir the pot and try to grab extra power and influence for their own political ends. It makes our Parliament look an absolute laughing stock in the eyes of the EU and in the rest of the world.

The talking has gone on long enough.

The way things work in this ‘democracy’ of ours it will probably be the politicians who will have responsibility for the final say, but this nation should and I hope will hold them accountable for their decisions.

It was the politicians of the 1960s and early 1970s who led us into this unholy mess in the first place. Many people back in 1975, and I was one of them, voted to remain in the EEC on the basis that we were in a ‘common market’ i.e. a European free trade area. I heard no politician at the time telling us us that to join the EEC meant that we would consequently lose sovereignty over our courts and our borders to what would become in effect a Federal State of Europe. Had they done so, I do not believe for one minute that the vote then to stay in the EEC would have been carried.

Either our own politicians back then did not see the writing on the wall, or they decided not to spill the beans. Either way they massively failed the British people. They led us into a hole which has become progressively deeper and deeper as the years have progressed. The old saying goes that if you find you are digging yourself into a hole then the best answer is to stop digging and get out. The time has come for us to do precisely that with the EU. One thing is pretty certain – if we don’t do it now, we probably never will.

From: Barrie Crowther, Walton, Wakefield.

“ALWAYS be prepared to walk,” says Donald Trump in his summit with the North Korean leader. Shame our weak-kneed Brexit negotiators, or indeed our lily-livered MPs, did not have the same attitude.