Gibraltar sovereignty referendum, 2002

Gibraltar sovereignty referendum
On 12 July 2002 the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, in a formal statement in the House of Commons, said that after twelve months of negotiation the British Government and Spain are in broad agreement on many of the principles that should underpin a lasting settlement of Spain's sovereignty claim, which included the principle that Britain and Spain should share sovereignty over Gibraltar. Do you approve of the principle that Britain and Spain should share sovereignty over Gibraltar?
Location	Gibraltar
Date	7 November 2002
Results Votes  % Yes 187 7000103000000000000♠1.03% No 17,900 7001989700000000000♠98.97% Valid votes 18,087 7001995100000000000♠99.51% Invalid or blank votes 89 6999490000000000000♠0.49% Total votes 18,176 100.00% Registered voters/turnout 20,678 7001879000000000000♠87.9%

On 12 July 2002 the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, in a formal statement in the House of Commons, said that after twelve months of negotiation the British Government and Spain are in broad agreement on many of the principles that should underpin a lasting settlement of Spain's sovereignty claim, which included the principle that Britain and Spain should share sovereignty over Gibraltar.

The Gibraltar sovereignty referendum of 2002 was a referendum which was called by the Government of Gibraltar and was held on 7 November 2002 within the British overseas territory on a proposal by the UK Government to share sovereignty of the territory between Spain and the United Kingdom. The result was a rejection of the proposal by a landslide majority, with only just over one per cent of the electorate in favour.

Although Gibraltar was ceded to the British Crown under of the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), Spain has wished to recover the territory, first by force and then by restrictions and diplomacy. Recovering sovereignty remains a stated objective of successive Spanish Governments.

In July 2001, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw began discussing the future of Gibraltar with Spain, and a year later, in July 2002, following secret talks with Spain announced that "the UK was willing to share sovereignty of Gibraltar with Spain" and that "the final decision would rest with the people of Gibraltar in a referendum.

HM Government of Gibraltar then decided to hold its own referendum on the 7th November 2002 regarding the proposal of shared sovereignty with Spain, which it strongly opposed. This pre-empted any referendum planned to be held after the negotiations between Britain and Spain had concluded. Jack Straw described the Gibraltar referendum as "eccentric", and Britain's Foreign Office announced it would not recognize its results.

Although Straw had felt confident enough to announce that there had been talks on joint sovereignty, a number of issues still remained to be resolved. Firstly, Spain was insisting on a time element for a full transfer of sovereignty to Spain. Secondly, Spain would not agree to give Gibraltar a referendum on either joint sovereignty or self-determination. Finally, Spain wanted a greater role than simply joint use of Gibraltar as a military base. Researcher Peter Gold argued in a 2009 paper that these disagreements made the possibility of an agreement being finalised remote.

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