Semi-British? • The Independent published the following letter on the Gibraltar dispute yesterday: Dear sir, Trevor Pateman writes (letter, 14 August) that the people of Gibraltar want to be what your headline calls “semi-British” and would never choose to be British if subject to mainland UK laws and tax. He should get his facts straight: our democratically elected government supported exactly that until Roy Hattersley vetoed the idea in 1976. We are British, have been for 300 years and are determined to remain so. This determination has persisted not only through the good times, but also the bad: the evacuation of our population during the Second World War to facilitate the war effort (some weren’t allowed to return until 1951), and the blockade of 1969 to 1985, which wasn’t just economically destructive, it separated families and cut us off from the outside world. There is a lot of history to our 309-year-old link with the UK. Please don’t pretend it’s just a matter of convenience. Matthew Pallas, Gibraltar
Posted on: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 09:00:11 +0000