audience when it arrived in Pembroke this week. It's hot and for some reason someone rammed through a referendum at the worst possible time of the year, mid-August. Anyway, by now the public knows that the travelling pro-Independence road show has little credibility because it is providing propaganda and not straight answers.

The problem is that the public would like some straight answers to some basic questions and it has been getting waffle. In the process of spending public money on "information'', the Government has done little but support Independence. In fact, the supposedly unbiased information has been so biased that we think a number of Cabinet ministers have seriously damaged their credibility and would today have difficulty winning a primary in their district.

This is because the Cabinet ministers appearing in the travelling pro-Independence road show have been remarkably short on telling the public what dangers there MIGHT, and we stress MIGHT, be.

Some of the tough questions the public should have answered are: What Finance Minister would ever admit that our dollar is not safe? What if we take a chance on Independence and the dollar is devalued, as some people predict, to about 67 US cents? What would that do to our economy? What would travel prone Bermudians say when they have to add another third to the cost of their travels? What if Independence is approved and it takes a few years to negotiate travel arrangements with the far flung places Bermudians like to visit? Right now "British on the passport is a big help in getting you through. The Immigration Officer in hard to pronounce vacation spots is unlikely even to have heard of Bermuda.

Of course, all the international companies will not leave, but what happens if just enough international companies pack up and leave after Independence to create middle class unemployment? They are now the largest employer of Bermudians. Where will well prepared and well educated Bermudians get jobs? Not in the ailing hotel industry, that's in trouble and not really being tended to.

The recession brought down house prices but high rents paid by international companies have helped to keep the prices up. Some rental properties are empty now. More will be empty when the base closes. What if some people find that their mortgage is greater than the value of their house? It happened in some areas of the US during the recession.

People from many islands to our south require US visas. We don't. What happens if the US -- or Canada -- decides that independent Bermudians require a visa? What about dual nationality? Many Bermudians have it now. At least one cabinet minister has been quoted as saying that Bermuda would "contemplate'' dual nationality. Is that good enough information? The Bahamas have had great problems with international drug smugglers. Bermuda has had very little trouble. What happens if billionaire drug lords decide to try their business in Bermuda? It happened in Belize after Independence. Huge sums of money can do terrible damage in a small place. Our Police Service is under-staffed and in the process of a difficult reorganisation.

Foreign currency restrictions are now considerably relaxed from a few years ago. What happens if we vote for Independence and on August 16 large numbers of people begin to sell up to move their money out of Bermuda? Could the local economy take the strain without lower standards of living? Could the local stock market prices collapse? There are many more questions. They should have been dealt with early in the referendum debate. They were not.