On whose behalf exactly does David Cameron think he is negotiating with the European Union approximately British membership (Cameron faces deadlock over EU benefit intention,18 December)? Not for Scotland, where his writ effectively doesn’t speed. Nor Northern Ireland for much the same reason. Probably not for Wales either, or where the Conservative party is in a large minority. Certainly not for the Labour,Liberal Democrat and Green parties who all have their own takes on the EU. This leaves a rump of Conservative and Ukip supporters in England whose future votes Cameron is assiduously courting. His regular vainglorious appearances before the TV cameras in which he claims to be “negotiating for Britain” are nothing more than partisan posturing. The sooner his European counterparts are enabled to understand that the better.
Robin Wendt
Chester• I am sick of Cameron talking for “the British people”. He doesn’t speak for almost 75% of the voting electorate and he doesn’t speak for the millions in the UK who fancy Europe, support the EU (albeit needing scrutiny and reform), and approve of in-work benefits for low-paid resident workers,delight in the free movement of EU citizens, support having a shared quota of refugees landed on mainland Europe, or detest the hold-ups crossing from Schengen into the UK and see huge advantages in ever closer union. Cameron only speaks for Tory and Ukip miniature Englanders. He doesn’t speak for me.
Alan Greenslade-Hibbert
Mollington,OxfordshireContinue reading...
Source: theguardian.com