Hopefully bill will die

THE EDITOR: The failure of the House of Representatives to achieve the majority required to grant Tobago more autonomy comes as a great relief. Hopefully any efforts to revive this bill will be delayed, ignored, then simply abandoned.

Autonomy for Tobago is so preposterous that I cannot see why or how this proposal has gone on as long as it has. Or how we ever arrived at the present situation where Tobago has a chief secretary, its own House of Assembly, and enjoys several powers that all other regional councils in Trinidad do not.

This leads to unnecessary duplication, costs, confusion in law, and the resultant governance to date does not stand out as anything desirable.

Just as we would not countenance "autonomy" for Cedros-Icacos, Mayaro-Guayaguayare, or Toco, we should not waste any time dealing with ridiculous demands from Tobago.

It will obviously require a referendum involving all of TT to enable the assessment of the popularity of any crazy ideas to sever any portion of the links bonding all parts of our country together. Proposals and preparation for such a referendum should be controlled within prescribed regulations.

Until such an idea is thus legally established, any such proposals (that lead inevitably to independence) should be treated as sedition and dealt with accordingly.

REG POTTER

Glencoe