A global recession is reason enough to stop or at least delay Brexit

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I am neither politician nor an economist, but you’d think that given the warnings of an approaching global recession, now would be a really good time to stop, or at least pause the Brexit process, while we see what develops.

This may seem strange to some Tories, but it’s called contingency planning. “What happens if…” It’s OK to moderate a long-term or shorter term plan, when it seems expedient to do so. This idea that you get an idea in your head and drive ahead with it, come rain or high water, is dangerous and naive.

Michael Cunliffe​
Ilkley

Raging hypocrisy

Shamima Begum has some explaining to do but let’s not pretend that we are an entirely innocent party. Right from the start of Syria’s wars we diplomatically sided with the insurgents. In quick order we trained so-called “moderate” insurgents and supplied them with “non-lethal” equipment. When it became obvious that Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey were aiding Islamic State, we turned a blind eye. We had become a recruiting sergeant for Islamic State.

After all, Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi and now Assad were deemed worthy of regime change even though all three were sworn enemies of radical Islam. The west was apparently operating on the basis of better the devil you don’t know than the one you do. Making it a criminal offence for British Muslims to join the insurgency amounted to shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.

Yugo Kovach
Dorset

Victim and captor

Has home secretary Sajid Javid, and the vitriolic denouncers of Ms Begum, ever heard of Stockholm Syndrome?

William Park
Lytham, St Annes

What will be on the ballot? (Ed: Remain or Theresa May’s deal)

Impressed as I am by The Independent’s zeal in campaigning for a second referendum, I am yet to see any firm proposals on what questions should be asked. To continue the crusade blithely ignoring such a crucial element indicates to me a lack of clear thinking.

Publish for us the fair and balanced questions that the paper believes should form “the people’s vote round two” so that we all know where we are.

Once they are known we can then have a referendum on what we should have a referendum about.

Bob Fennell​
Bromley

Let’s celebrate a trailblazer, whatever the gender

What an inspiring, bittersweet obituary on Captain Rosemary Ann Bryant Mariner, the “first woman fighter jet pilot and equal rights trailblazer”. An amazing woman and almost literally blasting her way through gender barriers. She, and others like her, fought long and hard and did it by showing people that our gender is not a factor in getting things done.

Wouldn’t it be great if we could go from being impressed by “first woman” to being impressed by “first person”. We need to get to a place where being a woman doing something first is not remarkable, it’s just normal.

Laura Dawson
Harpenden

Brexit should take a leaf out of NHS’s book

When a patient has signed a consent form in the clinic to allow me to operate I am obliged to countersign the form on the day of surgery to confirm that I have addressed any new concerns. Fully informed, up to date consent is mandatory following the Montgomery ruling in 2015 and the principles of openness and transparency now standard in the NHS. This is especially so if any of the information has changed.

Given that the information available on what leaving the EU means (the government's deal) is very different to that advertised before the referendum, the likely result of the “operation” is certainly going to be worse. The government's only alternative (no deal) is commonly acknowledged to be catastrophic.

If I threatened a patient into having an operation with a poorer outcome than originally advertised, with the only alternative being an operation that was downright dangerous, and disallowed the patient the right to veto, I would be stopped from doing the operation.

Thus, a principle deeply embedded in one area of public life is completely ignored in another. Why is the government not obliged to apply the same rules as we are in the NHS, to allow the public a rethink on the consent given in the Brexit referendum?

Richard Welbourn MD FRCS, consultant surgeon
Taunton