A date with destiny looms on EU future

THE announcement that more than 11,000 asylum seekers have been waiting over seven years to hear whether they can stay or not is negligence of the highest order.

Can I suggest that when queues get so bad, you simply raise the bar and say “no”? We have all these asylum seekers because the benefits system means people will use any trick they can think of to get on to the system. Let them try Canada, Australia or anywhere but here!

From: Don Burslam, Elm Road, Dewsbury Moor, Dewsbury.

I LOOK forward to lancing the EU boil by bringing on the referendum. A vote to stay in would give a massive boost to business and trade and would completely cut the ground from under Ukip. The result would be of enormous benefit to the UK, stabilising and clarifying a fluid situation.

From: John Watson, Leyburn.

WELL done David Blunkett. The man who I considered at one time to be one of our best Home Secretaries has put his cards on the table and said in Queen’s English what he feels about our immigration policies. Having been born and bred in this country, and having lived to the age that I am, I sometimes feel that I don’t belong here.

From: Dr Glyn Powell, Kellington, Goole.

THE EU’s demand that British taxpayers pay a further £1.7bn towards its budget means that crunch time has arrived early for David Cameron. Instead of intimating that he will delay payment and risk incurring millions of pounds in fines under EU rules, Cameron should declare withdrawal.

Nothing of value will be achieved in negotiations and certainly not on key issues, such as budget contributions and immigration controls.

From: Arthur Quarmby, Underhill, Holme.

NATIONALLY, we need to weld the UK together again with the restoration of real power and authority to the regions, perhaps in something like the form of the Swiss cantons.

In fact, Switzerland is well worth studying. They do not interfere in the affairs of other countries; they do a great deal of humanitarian and charitable work but apart from that they mind their own business and concentrate on increasing their country’s prosperity.

From: Colin McNamee, Hull.

THE question, simple in reality, is who does the UK electorate wish to govern them? Their elected representatives in Westminster, while retaining the reserved right to get rid of them every four or five years or so, or an EU “parliament” where they have some eight to nine per cent representation but where the majority of UK legislation is created? Who do you wish to govern you? The UK or the EU? Everything else is secondary. The issue is one of sovereignty.

From: Cecil Hallas, Cubley Rise Road, Penistone, Sheffield.

I HAVE no quarrel with Europeans, most of whom have similar aspirations to ourselves. What is concerning is the appetite for power by the unelected. Although in the public eye their arrogant dismissal of audits is consistent with their sacking of any employee who finds “irregularities” in the EU books, sailing along for 18 years without having the accounts sanctioned is unacceptable.

From: David W Wright, Uppleby, Easingwold.

AS David Cameron is so forthright in his statement to refuse to pay the £1.7bn payment to the EU, why does he not give the UK electors the immediate right to leave the EU and not at some indeterminate time possibly in 2017 – presumably to suit his and the Conservative Party’s faint hopes of remaining in power. It is obvious that he is running scared of Ukip’s growing support.

From: Nick Martinek, Briarlyn Road, Huddersfield.

NO ONE with any sense wants to donate another £1.7bn to the EU, except perhaps a few europhiles.

So it is no wonder that the legacy parties are frothing at this enormous imposition. But I suspect it is all bluster. David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg must know that the real boss in this country is the EU.

And that is the direct result of our very own UK politicians – Labour, Tory and Liberal Democrats – handing our sovereignty to the EU over the past 40 years. Moreover, the £1.7bn bill is at least partly the result of the EU persisting with the failing and dangerous currency union experiment.

Thankfully we did not abandon our own currency and Mr Cameron assured us that the UK would not subsidise the euro. It is time he actually stood by what he promises for once.

From: David H Rhodes, Keble Park North, Bishopthorpe, York.

WHEN discussing whether the bank rate should go up, most people look sympathetically at those with a mortgage and wonder how they will afford the repayments. Can we look at the other side of the coin, at that of the saver who, on accumulating the savings, probably had bigger mortgage payments to contend with than those of today?

The Bank of England base rate was cut to 0.5 per cent in March 2009. A saver investing at 0.5 per cent and with inflation at approximately two per cent per annum will by now have lost 10 per cent of their capital.

A good inducement to encourage saving don’t you think?