The Conservatives promised a referendum on the Alternative Vote. They then spent a vast amount of money and told many lies to persuade people to vote against it.

This was bad news for the future of democracy in this country, but it was not a disaster, and we can return to the issue of voting systems which are better for democracy in future.

However the government has now offered a referendum on future membership of the European Union. Leaving the European Union would be a total disaster.

But David Cameron has now created a situation in which people will be persuaded to vote to leave because he has not been able to achieve some bizarre targets which he has been persuaded are the most important. Other EU countries are struggling to work out what it is that Cameron wants to achieve, and are getting confused and annoyed. Once again many lies are being told. The Sun Newspaper has been telling lies about the EU for twenty years. Murdoch and the rightwing Americans would love to see the EU weakened. The EU is a democratic organisation, its accounts have been approved every year for the last 17 years, it is untrue to say that we could continue to trade with the EU if we left, OK if, like Norway and Switzerland we followed all the EU rules including free movement of people etc.

The referendum should never have been offered. It should have been up to the elected government, which agreed to the Maastricht Treaty, the Lisbon Treaty etc.

Now that it has been offered we need to make sure that all our friends and neighbours vote again the daft idea of leaving

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