the Gibraltarians themselves

Far from being "Britain with more sun" as it is often portrayed, Gibraltar hosts a mix of ethnicities: its population of 29,000 includes people of Italian, British, Spanish, Maltese, Portuguese, German, and North African origins. All of these nationalities, and others besides, contributed to the demographic  development of the Gibraltarian people in the years after 1704. In addition, 10,000 Spanish nationals cross the border each day to work on the Rock.this binary view of the issue of Gibraltar's sovereignty completely misses the point because since 1713 a third party has become involved in the Gibraltar dispute: the Gibraltarians themselves.

In 1999 the then chief minister Peter Caruana asserted, in a speech to the UN, "that Gibraltar belongs to the people of Gibraltar and is neither Spain's to claim, nor Britain's to give away".

A referendum held subsequently in 2002, after Britain and Spain had discussed shared sovereignty, found that 98.97% of the population was against  Gibraltar being handed back to Spain.