Liz Truss must stop demonising our European allies: Yorkshire Post Letters

Rarely do I attempt to represent the views of 2016 Leave voters.

But I would like to think that few of them agree with David H Rhodes’s stance that there is any kind of equivalence between the European Union and 1940s Nazi Germany (The Yorkshire Post, September 13).

It shouldn’t need saying: The EU and its member states are our friends, natural political allies and most important trading partners.

Many Leave voters might have voted differently if they had known that their support for Brexit would be interpreted as endorsing the offensive view that the UK’s position in 2016 bore any resemblance to the peril it faced in 1939.

Mr Rhodes’s position and language are extreme throughout; he describes groups such as Leeds for Europe as “appeasers”, for example.

Such unpleasant opinions are fuelled on social media, in reactionary parts of our national press, and now by a Liz Truss-led Government that seeks out cheap political gains from demonising European allies.

The tragic events surrounding Ukraine ought to have provided enough clarity about who our true allies and real enemies are.

The statesmanship shown by European leaders as they displayed their respect for the late Queen and regret at her passing was that of close friends and fellow mourners.

Thankfully, the anti-European poison evident in British politics and parts of our society isn’t so far being reciprocated in a significant way on the continent.

Mr Rhodes claims “backing Brexit” will “benefit all”. Who are part of the “all” he’s writing about?

It’s certainly not firms wanting to trade freely with Europe or farmers hit by terrible post-Brexit trade deals; nor anyone with ambitions to study, work, retire, or just travel freely throughout Europe; or anyone concerned about rights for workers, environmental protections and consumer safeguards. I could go on.

Suffice to say, Mr Rhodes speaks for a tiny minority. His outdated worldview has caused immense damage to this country.

If we are going to fix our problems, we need to look to the future. Not live in the past.

Paul Morley, Ribblesdale Estate, Long Preston, Skipton.

No disrespect intended, but whenever I see the name Canon Michael Storey in the letters page (The Yorkshire Post, September 19) an image of a record revolving on a turntable with the needle stuck in the same groove springs immediately to mind.

Same old story - a minority decision can never be truly democratic he yet again informs us.

If the good Canon would remove his Remainer issue tunnel vision spectacles he would see how democratic this result is.

Everyone eligible to vote had the chance to vote, the fact that some chose not to is their democratic right. What’s not democratic about that then?

Also, there is the assumed idea that everyone who didn’t vote would have voted to remain.

Had many more people decided to vote and the result had been an even bigger majority to leave the EU what other ‘crime’ against democracy would Canon Storey and others of his ilk be berating us with?.