We don't need an EU referendum

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/jan/29/we-dont-need-eu-referendum

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Vernon Bogdanor is right that referendums are justified on proposals to change the way in which we are governed, but wrong to conclude that "Labour must back this vote" (Comment, 28 January). No one in the UK, the other member states or the EU institutions is seeking treaty amendment or any alteration to governance of the UK. This vote has nothing to do with such profound issues. David Cameron's pledge to hold an in-out referendum in several years' time, on issues yet to be identified and negotiated, by a government yet to be elected, has not been made in pursuit of legitimacy or certainty or, indeed, democracy. It is because he is more willing to risk the wellbeing of the UK as an investment location than to face down the militant Europhobes in his party.

Labour, as Professor Bogdanor says, was "formed to combat the power of elites". That is why there is strong support in the UK and other EU labour movements for the major advances in working conditions and rights, environmental standards, consumer protection, anti-cartel measures, combating international crime, improving banking rules and supervision, and many other EU achievements. Many of those obligations on employers and business are also among the prime reasons for Tory anti-EU zeal. Professor Bogdanor and others who support sustained UK engagement in the EU should recognise that, resist the siren call of Cameron's referendum and focus on stopping his reckless wheeze by beating the Tories in 2015. Neil Kinnock House of Lords

• Vernon Bogdanor is wrong to say we do not elect parliament to transfer its powers to another body. Parliament transferred the whole of its functions in Ireland to the Irish parliaments in 1920, its judicial functions from the Lords to the supreme court in 2005, appropriate ecclesiastical functions to the Church of Scotland in 1925, revoked its competence in Australia (1986) and Canada (1982), and transferred a whole range of powers to the EU. He would do better to examine how referendums are steadily weakening representative government. John Hall Bristol