Nigel Lawson has highlighted the importance of the view, largely neglected by the remain campaign, that membership of the European Union carries a “really serious democratic deficit” (Saturday interview, 2 April). By legitimising a tit-for-tat exchange with Brexit campaigners that it’s all about the economy and potential job losses, the remain campaigners have ignored the extent to which political decisions are framed in an “us and them” narrative in the popular press. By asserting that we can stay in Europe for economic reasons but drawing a red line under ever closer political union, the remain camp colludes with the kinds of crude distortions that assert that EU commissioners can decree that our children are forbidden to blow up balloons and that murderers and rapists in our prisons must retain their right to vote in elections (both cited to me as good reasons for voting Brexit).
How about a Guardian supplement that provides some substantive information on how EU legislation is agreed and implemented and the kinds of rules it implements? How many people know that there are 751 members of the European parliament and that 73 of these are from UK regions? Who knows that this parliament (all elected by proportional representation, in 2014 on a 42.54% turnout of 375 million eligible voters) has legislative precedence over both the European council and the commissioners? Who knows that all the leaders of the 28 countries meet as the European council to thrash out a consensus approach to shared challenges? Far from faultless, the EU is subject to the inevitable pressures of the kind of corporate power that undermines humanitarian values. Nevertheless it provides a small step towards a principled union on a democratic agenda and one to which a (Guardian-initiated?) debate is long overdue.
Gwen Wallace
Emeritus professor, University of Derby
• With regard to Yanis Varoufakis’s article (Why we must save the EU, 5 April), there are all the reasons to love Germany but there is, in my view, no reason at all to expect any bailout of debts without a price on sovereignty. I think it is quite clear: the euro is simply a trap (sweet or not!). A reasonable arrangement would be to keep the euro for France and Germany alone. The others, indeed, do not need it in their own countries. Meanwhile, any member state of the eurozone should have the courage to make the leap of faith without succumbing to tragedy.
Democracy is probably the most important way to express the principle of liberty in the modern times (and in noble terms!). But, ultimately, who really cares about “democracy”, except a few noble souls here and there? People care mostly about their pockets; and then about, yes, power. So, the fact that the current Europe does not pass the checks of democracy is a very important sign. But democracy checks are not exactly a building tool. The European perestroika would require a wider kind of effort; an effort that would probably include serious talks with the other quarters of the global village.
Youssef Fakhro
Ashrafiat Sahnaya, Syria
• I am astonished at how low politicians will stoop to make their point on the advantages of remaining in the EU. The four former Labour health secretaries have written a scaremongering letter (4 April) without making a single point as to how leaving the EU could directly affect the NHS adversely. The only indirect issue they could bring up was that leaving the EU may weaken the economy, and there is no proof of this. Most independent reviews point to a strengthening of the economy by leaving the EU. Leaving the EU will in fact reduce the cost of “NHS tourism”, remove the ridiculous EU rules regarding tendering etc which often means contracts going to the big boys and not the most economic and efficient providers, and the opening up of the NHS to predatory companies from across the Atlantic made possible by the TTIP arrangements made by the EU.
Dr Santi Vathenen
Alcester, Warwickshire
• Timothy Garton Ash (Being impartial on the EU is not enough, 1 April) is right in saying the BBC is too timid. However, whether or not the BBC or anyone else makes robust cases for both sides, the out campaign would seem to start with an advantage just in its title. Brexit is an easy, memorable catchword, already made comprehensible and striking with all the earlier Grexit furore. By contrast, “I’m in” seems devoid of passion or even meaning. In what? May I suggest that those who, with good reason, wish to remain in the EU, find a more interesting, punchy title? How about “Brit-in”? Doubtless some opposing bright spark would delight in saying it was “diminishing our great nation by leaving out the A”, to which the answer might be: “Not at all. Just lending it to the outers to help them make “Breaxit”.
Forty-odd years of European peace and common cause for this country.
Judy Greengrass
London
• Jackie Ashley writes with her usual eloquent passion (Let’s be brutally honest. This EU remain campaign is failing, 30 March) and makes some important points about the EU campaign. However I disagree with her central argument that the remain campaign should imitate the “stunts” and “fighting talk” of the Brexiters. Neither do I agree that the remain side is losing.
Labour, unlike the Tories, is united in our campaign to keep Britain in the European Union. But we haven’t just agreed some motions at annual conference and rested on our laurels. I, Alan Johnson and others have been making the argument to remain across the UK since the referendum date was announced on 22 February. Labour MPs and activists have been campaigning hard, including Jeremy Corbyn, who was out campaigning on the streets for our national campaign day only a few weeks ago and has already released two positive YouTube videos for the campaign. Andy Burnham and Hilary Benn both made strong speeches last month making clear why remaining in the EU will benefit their constituents and the departments they shadow.
Alan Johnson made a number of passionate speeches across the country rebutting the myths perpetrated by Gove, Grayling and Boris Johnson. Ed Miliband made his first intervention since stepping down as Labour leader to make the case for why Labour supporters should vote remain, and Jeremy Corbyn, Tom Watson and other shadow cabinet members will all also be making major speeches to set out a positive Labour case for remain in the coming months. Just last week, Heidi Alexander wrote a fantastic piece highlighting why leaving the EU would damage our NHS, Angela Eagle has been clear that if our steel industry is to have a future it relies on being part of the EU, Keir Starmer was clear about the benefits being part of the EU brings for British security that he witnessed first-hand as director of public prosecutions, and Jackie may have missed that someone did respond to Michael Gove’s speech on sovereignty – Tristram Hunt in his piece in the New Statesman on 25 March.
Perhaps Jackie is right in suggesting that only the outrageous and the extreme get reported, but Labour In for Britain will not go down that spittle-inflected route. Campaigns like this are won in local communities where Labour has knocked on thousands of doors finding out where the pro-EU votes are and persuading people since January. Labour is the only significant national political party that is out there making the case for Britain to remain in the European Union, and so until 23 June we won’t stop fighting for our communities and the better future they’ll have in the EU.
Pat Glass MP
Shadow minister for Europe
• Fawzi Ibrahim (Letters, 31 March) wants to use the EU referendum to inflict maximum embarrassment on the government. He need not worry: the Conservative party’s civil war on the subject guarantees that, whatever the result, damage to its credibility is assured.
Far better, then, that he ponder a little deeper on which way to vote. As a trade unionist, Mr Ibrahim might consider that it is no coincidence that the most vehement opponents of our EU membership are to be found on the neoliberal right wing of the Conservatives and in Ukip. They hate the EU because its common market comes with common rules to protect consumers, workers and the environment. Those rules can certainly be improved, but their very existence is enough to make neoliberal ideologues apoplectic.
The Labour party (from leader to grassroots) and most trade unions stand united in campaigning to remain in the EU – not because it is perfect (what is?), but because we recognise that political battles must be fought at the appropriate level, and this includes the European level. Battles are not won by walking off the battlefield.
Richard Corbett
Deputy leader of the Labour MEPs
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