My letter to EU President Tusk

The e-mail that I just sent to

press.president@consilium.europa.eu

To: His Excellency Mr Doald Tusk
The President, Council of the European Union
Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 175
B-1048 Brussels
Belgium

29 March 2017

Dear Mr Tusk,

Notice of Individual A50 dissent

I refer to the Treaty on European Union as amended by the Treaty of Lisbon signed on 13 December 2007 in Lisbon.

I am informed that notice has been given to the European Council by the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, pursuant to Article 50 of the Treaty of Lisbon, of the intention of the British government to withdraw the United Kingdom (the “UK”) from the European Union (the “EU”).

As a British national and citizen of the EU, I hereby notify the Council of my dissent from and objections to this act of the British government. For the avoidance of doubt, I do not consent to being deprived of my European Citizenship or the rights conferred by that citizenship. Further, quite apart from not having my consent, I contend that, contrary to its claim, the British government does not have a democratic mandate from the people of the UK to leave the EU and accordingly I object to and contest the validity of its notice served under Article 50.2.

While reserving my position on whether the British government has complied with the requirements of Article 50.1, the basis for my opposition to its notice of intention to withdraw is that the referendum, which is the source of the mandate claimed by the British government, was fundamentally flawed as set out below.

I contend that the result of the referendum should be treated as void (notwithstanding that it was non-binding in any event) for the following reasons (inter alia):

(a) During the months prior to the referendum, voters were subjected to an onslaught of misrepresentations by those campaigning and in the British news and social media, much of which took the form of distortions of facts that were calculated to mislead readers. As a result, the majority of voters were either uninformed or wrongly informed about the pertinent issues and by no stretch of the imagination could the referendum result truthfully be described as a democratic exercise in informed choice;

(b) Only 37.5% of those eligible to vote, voted in favour of leaving the EU (17.4 million persons);

(c) Several million British nationals who arguably should have been eligible to vote, were excluded from doing so. Those excluded comprised, amongst others (i) the entire 16-18 age group, although the same group were able to vote in the recent Scottish referendum on independence; (ii) non-UK EU member state nationals resident in the UK, although nationals of Commonwealth nations and Eire resident in the UK were able to vote; and (iii) British nationals who had been resident outside the UK for more than 15 years, including those residing in the EU; and

(d) In spite of a large body of evidence that in the 9 months since the referendum was held a sizeable fraction of those who voted to leave the EU have changed their minds as the issues have crystallised, the British government refused a second referendum before giving notice to the Council.

In conclusion, I humbly request that my objection to being forcibly deprived of my European Citizenship and corresponding rights is noted and acted upon by the Council. Further, I request that the Council note my grounds for objecting to the British government's notice of intention to leave the EU and take them into account in its response to that notice.

Please be good enough to acknowledge this communication.

Yours,
etc