'make a referendum' is correct and usable in written English.
It is used when referring to a vote of all members of a group or electorate on a specific question. Example sentence: The Prime Minister proposed to make a referendum to determine if the citizens wanted to adopt the new law.
The then prime minister had wanted to make a referendum on the euro a centrepiece of his second term.
But to avoid putting this to the test, their efforts are bent on avoiding referendums (except for Ireland, whose law may make a referendum unavoidable).
He is much less prominent and controversial than David Davis, the ex-shadow home secretary who has quixotically resigned his parliamentary seat, triggering a by-election that he wants to make a referendum on civil liberties.
Mr. Boehner's stance threatened to throw Congress back into the debt-limit stalemate that consumed Washington in 2011, but this time at the height of a campaign that Republicans are trying to make a referendum on Mr. Obama's handling of the economy.
As Gaby Hinsliff wrote in her snap verdict on the PM: For Tory waverers-to-Ukip, there was a renewed vow to make a referendum on Europe a red line, effectively ruling out another Liberal Democrat coalition (though since most of those Lib Dems likely to survive are if anything even less keen, that's perhaps not as significant as it once was).
You cannot absolutely rule out Labour feeling compelled to make a referendum pledge in the event that the pressure to match a Tory promise of a plebiscite became really intense, but it is now clear that this would be the last choice of the Labour leader.
Indeed the UK government has upped the stakes, and made a referendum a reality.
Salmond's stunning victory in May 2011 had made a referendum inevitable, but its details were yet to be determined.
The issue of referendum timing and the refugee crisis also concerns Downing Street, but it has been assumed that if the UK cannot complete its negotiations in time for the 17 February EU council and a referendum in June, then a deal would be reached in March, making a referendum possible in late September.
The convulsions that afflict Britain's Conservative Party over European Union membership make a 2017 referendum a near certainty and a pullout a distinct possibility.
And a further development this week may make a British referendum even harder to win: the European Commission's confirmation of its proposals to phase out the British EU budget rebate.
