Voting `yes' in the August 15 referendum would be like going on a picnic in a blinding rainstorm, a former Finance Minister said this week.

And, he said, the current weather forecast was ominous and forbidding because Bermuda had not recovered fully from the recession and had taken on the added burdens of running the airport and developing the Base lands.

Dr. Clarence James made these observations during a United Bermuda Party forum at the St. Mark's Church Hall on Thursday night.

He called on Government to "get back on track'' and concentrate its efforts on providing real equality of opportunity because that is the best way to create racial harmony and a feeling of national pride.

"I do not subscribe to the premise that by voting yes (on August 15) Independence will be the catalyst for resolving our current divisiveness,'' he told the mostly white and middle-aged audience of about 60 people.

"This is a false hope. Indeed Independence may actually do the opposite.

"The successful formula for bringing our people together...has always been the pursuit of equal opportunity for education, jobs and businesses.'' Fellow panelist and former UBP senator Mr. Wendell Hollis said that the current anti-Independence feeling among Bermudians could be easily understood because there was no "discernible reason'' for Bermuda to become independent.

Moreover, Mr. Hollis said that if such a reason existed, Bermudians would come together and tackle the issue squarely.

There may be argument over procedure, he said, but in the main the issue would be resolved.

"Why work on an issue that the country doesn't really want,'' he asked.

"What could we have done in the last 18 months to deal with the problems we have now with drugs?'' Furthermore, Mr. Hollis said that if the war on drugs had received the same kind of attention that the issue of Independence received -- at weekly forums and Parliamentary debates -- Bermuda would have been closer to a solution.

Mr. Hollis said that Bermuda would only be ready for Independence when "black and white Bermudians'' took that path together.

But Independence advocate Mr. Michael Winfield said that there would never be a time when Bermudians achieved a 100 per cent consensus on any issue and it was simply unrealistic to expect otherwise.

Mr. Winfield, a former Government Senate leader, said Bermudians would wake up on the day after Independence and find that no miracle had occurred.

"The truth is Independence will not solve all our problems nor will it be a source of many more.

"We'd still be a member of the Commonwealth if we went independent and we'd still have the Queen as our head of state, but I believe our citizenship position might be better.'' United Bermuda Party backbencher Mrs. Grace Bell, who also expressed pro-Independence views, said that Independence at its most elemental, was about people, self-determination and nationhood, and not exclusively about money.

She said that Government was more than capable of coping well with several issues at once and it was simply not true that the Independence issue was a distraction from other "more important matters.''