UK sovereignty can be both lost and gained

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/feb/29/uk-sovereignty-can-be-both-lost-and-gained

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Jonathan Freedland (The Brexit camp is wrong: we’re already sovereign, 27 February) is right to say sovereignty is not like virginity in that it can be taken back – and that’s why those of us who want out are campaigning to regain the sovereignty that has been surrendered by our membership of the EU. However, sovereignty and virginity have one thing in common: they are indivisible and cannot be shared or pooled. Sharing sovereignty is as absurd as sharing virginity.

However, contrary to Jonathan Freedland, cooperation between nations on matters of mutual interest is not sovereignty lost or shared. It is in fact an assertion of sovereignty. Did the US, Britain and the Soviet Union lose their sovereignty by their cooperation to defeat Hitler? On the other hand, the fact that David Cameron, having won a general election on a promise of making changes to the benefit system, was unable to do so without the consent of 27 foreign countries does indicate a loss of sovereignty.

As for the argument that we have to be in the EU to have a seat at the table where decisions that affect us are taken, it is just a device designed to avoid discussing the nature of the EU. You wouldn’t join the local mafia just to have a say in its decisions unless you agree with its smuggling, money-laundering and blackmail activities. And the EU is no less of a mafia – a mafia of big corporations. Its pay-up-or-we’ll-break-your-country treatment of Greece is a quintessential racketeering technique that would have warmed the heart of Al Capone.

Whether it’s the TTIP free trade agreement with the US, the imposition of austerity or the incessant attack on collective rights of workers in Greece, Spain, Romania and other member states, the EU has little to commend it to trade unionists and working people in Britain.Fawzi IbrahimTrade Unionists Against the EU

• I am glad that Jonathan Freedland has demolished the myth peddled by some Brexit advocates that membership of the EU is a surrender of sovereignty. The sovereignty of the UK parliament remains intact. EU law prevails in Britain because the UK parliament legislated to that effect in the European Communities Act 1972. The supremacy of EU law depends entirely on the will of parliament and will continue unless and until parliament decides to amend or repeal the 1972 act.Geoffrey BindmanLondon

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