some members at the top of the United Bermuda Party fail to behave in any sensible or straightforward way. Last Monday night's ZBM-TV programme made it very clear to the people that attempts to mislead them are now out in the open.

First of all, the programme was not announced as a party political broadcast which must have led some viewers to think it was the regular Monday evening ZBM News and Views or something very similar. It was not. It was a party political broadcast paid for by the United Bermuda Party. Yet, amazingly, it was a pro-Independence party political broadcast from the UBP whose membership, generally, does not support Independence.

Three UBP Cabinet Ministers, one neutral as the Minister of Information and two strongly pro-Independence, appeared with a questioning audience.

There seemed to be some attempt to suggest that this was the Cabinet Green Paper Committee in action and thus a representative broadcast. As such it demonstrates just how biased the Green Paper Committee was. It was not representative nor was there any attempt at representative views on the panel.

The audience was, however, more varied and a good deal more open and honest than the panel.

Within minutes of the beginning of the broadcast which was supposed to be informational, two of the ministers, Deputy Premier the Hon. John Irving Pearman and Transport Minister the Hon. Maxwell Burgess, began to advocate Independence. The Minister of Information, the Hon. Jerome Dill, did his best to remain neutral and to provide information as opposed to propaganda but the struggle was uneven. We think Mr. Dill has been unfairly accused of being pro-Independence on the programme even though he may be so in private.

The fact is that the Government has promised the people a supply of information on Independence between now and August 15. On Monday it got as far from that promise as it could possibly get. Right thinking Ministers who genuinely wanted to inform the public would not have appeared on the programme when they arrived at ZBM and realised it was one-sided.

Where were the anti-Independence advocates? We do not know. So far we have heard any number of explanations for the non-appearance of anti-Independence Education Minister the Hon. Clarence Terceira and the fence-sitting Finance Minister the Hon. David Saul. Even had they been present on ZBM the programme would not have been representative. Be that as it may, if they were not going to appear the hierarchy of the UBP had a duty to fulfill its promises not to mislead the public and to find anti-Independence people to appear on their party political broadcast. That should not have been difficult as, after all, about 90 percent of the UBP appear to be anti-Independence.

What resulted was a sham. But more than that, it indicated that the hierarchy of the UBP is not going to play fair with the general public, nor is it going to respect the wishes of its followers, never mind anyone else. UBP leaders started by trying to deny citizens free speech and attacking anyone who opposed them and then complained loudly when anyone attacked back. Now they are prepared to misrepresent the Independence information to the public despite their own promises.

The people of Bermuda should not look forward to the next six or so weeks before August 15.