September 23.
As the French -- supposed Europhiles -- have voted neither ''Oui'' nor
''Non'' but a definite ''Peut-etre'' on Maastricht, it should be quite
obvious even to Mr Major that a referendum is essential here too.
While I do not believe that referendums should become part of the
political scene, there are three points in favour this time.
First, we have been, possibly deliberately, underinformed about the
possible ramifications of closer links with Europe and are sadly
ignorant of what is before us. Further public discussion and debate is
therefore essential.
Secondly, and perhaps allied to the above, why should we tag along
behind the moderately keen Irish and the positively half-hearted French
without having our tuppence worth?
Thirdly, whatever way we voted, we elected a Government to run the
country. That Government may not ''move the goalposts'' and renege on
its obligation to govern without reference to the public.
As an afterthought I cannot for the life of me see why we must forge
closer links with Europe. While all in favour of international
co-operation, I firmly believe that the proposed close ties will prove
divisive and, ultimately, destructive.
John Douglas,
1 Chacefield Wood,
Denny.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article