Beware the siren call of a new Brexit referendum

Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

(Angela Christofilou/The Independent)

The Independent’s latest editorial eloquently makes the case for a Final Say referendum, just as that same case is made passionately in your daily letters page.

Feelings are running high and clearly many are convinced another vote will provide the answer that our political leadership seems unable to find. Yet we need to be careful that wishful thinking on how the public mood might be shifting does not take us down a path of yet more divisive uncertainty.

I voted Remain back in 2016, and was deeply disappointed by the result. Yet being on the “winning” side in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum has in some ways proved to be an equally unsatisfactory outcome. Arguably so far the ramifications of both the 2014 and 2016 referendums has been to make us all losers.

The repercussion of a substantial proportion of the people not accepting the 2014 result, encouraged by the various political ambitions of those who lead us, have left Scotland in a perpetual state of discord.

Will the UK as a whole be any different if a second EU vote is held and delivers a result that favours one side or the other by a statistically insignificant majority? The kind of margin that the losing side might argue would be overturned based on some subsequent new development or opinion poll result?

Referendums might have a place in confirming public opinion but politicians that try to use them to get their way have a responsibility to ensure that their terms and conditions are carefully thought through and enable real progress to made, and to ensure that they do not simply provide a stepping stone to yet more uncertainty.

Keith Howell
Scottish Borders

Population explosion?

It has just been reported by the UN that a million species, including vital plants and insects, are under threat of extinction.

The main cause is the massive rise in the human population which is encroaching on other species because of our chemical pollution, plastic and other waste, and our destruction of forests and the rest of the natural environment. This could ultimately lead to the destruction of humankind.

The time is long overdue to limit size of our population. It could be done by financial measures to encourage people to have no more than two children, except in special compassionate circumstances. Family allowances and other benefits could be paid for the first two children only.

This won’t be popular with some – but we are fighting for ecological survival now.

Name and address supplied

A matter of interpretation

Please will somebody, anybody, interpret the results from the council elections last week as NOT IN FAVOUR of Brexit!

It seems obvious to me that all the parties supporting Brexit lost heavily, whilst the only “winners” were the parties saying NO.

Both the two main political parties seem hell-bent on a Brexit of some kind, whereas the majority of the population now sees what a folly this is and wants nothing more than the revoking of Article 50.

Sue Wilson
Address supplied

Lessons for the education dept?

Why does the Department for Education consistently insist on providing figures which bear no relation to need when asked about school budgets? In the figures quoted they omit information for the 2018-19 financial year instead showing an increase over two years; perhaps they are hoping we won’t notice.

The increase given is paltry and barely exceeds the amount needed to cover increased costs let alone allow schools to address nearly a decade of neglect. It tells us nothing about funding per pupil and how that varies in different areas. Presumably, there are more children.

When will the Department for Education realise that in spite of the crippling damage done to schools under the Conservatives people are not stupid? The least they can do is to be honest and transparent.

David Lowndes
Hampshire

Scottish battleground

Apparently the SNP is feeling good about the prospect of retaining its two seats in the forthcoming European elections (assuming they take place) and even taking a third, from the Tories. Is it over-optimistic?

True, it’s likely to keep the two it has. But many pro-UK Scots who voted Remain are heartily sick of Nicola Sturgeon using our EU votes to attempt to legitimise staging a second independence referendum.

The Lib Dem tradition runs deeply in Scotland and its strong pro-EU stance was rewarded in recent local elections elsewhere in the UK. Could we see the Lib Dems picking up a seat in the EU elections rather than a third going to the nationalists?

Martin Redfern
Edinburgh

Wicked comparison

Whilst smiling at Fred Nicholson’s revelation of the similarity between Greta Thunberg and Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, I can’t help feeling he underestimates the power of speaking out... And somebody’s got to!

The issues Greta is raising are all too real.

He’s got a point about the wicked witch of May though.

Lynda Newbery
Bristol