Interfering tentacles of EU bureaucrats

From: Gordon Lawrence, Stumperlowe View, Sheffield.

JOHN Murray attacks David Cameron for his proposal to offer a referendum on the UK’s possible withdrawal from the EU (Yorkshire Post, May 22). He typically presents the Europhile case by warning of the dire consequences of exit but slides over the EU’s insidious erosion of our political independence and the resultant damage to our freedoms and economic welfare. The march towards political union he completely ignores; the next step towards this goal being central fiscal control to save the euro.

Do I take it that Mr Murray is content for a United States of Europe to emerge with ourselves a conscripted member? This is the real issue! Of course, the stock response to this question is as hollow as a big drum and just as often beaten that our influence to change things can be achieved from the inside.

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The historical evidence proves this to be patently untrue; we are nearly always dragged in by the tide of bureaucratic self-interest and the power of the big founder members, all made worse by the introduction of majority voting.

The very diversity of the 25 member states, in culture, stage of economic development, history and geography engenders new conflicts of interest, very often, at odds with Britain’s.

To bolster the Europhile case, John Murray drops the big name of Barack Obama; the President, who rarely demonstrates much empathy towards our country, recently expressed the importance of Britain’s relationship with the EU, clearly seeing America’s interests can be well served through the agency of the UK’s membership. But this opportunistic attitude hardly addresses any of the problems that confront our government; I don’t think Washington itself would willingly tolerate being a member of such an undemocratic, bureaucratic organisation as the EU. Plainly, Obama sees Britain only as a pawn operating to further US global ambitions.

Mr Murray claims sardonically that the EU debate must be a welcome distraction for David Cameron from the real issues of the country.

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If the writer considers the drastic demolition of our democratic status, as Europe consolidates further into a super-state, is an irrelevant distraction opposed, as he says, to Britain’s best interests, I think he would be better employed as a stand-up comedian. Such assertions usually emanate from the self-serving bureaucrats and gravy-chasing politicians that flourish in the corridors of the Brussels’ complex.

The real issues for this country such as unemployment, the fiscal deficit, economic growth, social cohesion and immigration, for instance, all demand for a successful resolution an untrammelled, strong government without the EU’s interfering tentacles constantly inhibiting progress as they grab more and more control.

I believe Mr Murray is sadly mistaken when he ignores the gravity of that interference.

Limited loyalty to Britain

From: R Hanson, Swallow Lane, Golcar, Huddersfield.

SUCH jubilation over foreign companies buying British companies. Why? I thought that getting into a market was to sell the goods you make, not buy up companies.

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For the most part they only have loyalty to Britain for what they can get out of Britain. The last Ford car was made in Britain in 2002. Tata Steel bought a state of the art steel plant in Middlesbrough in 2007, closed 
it in 2010 and then along with SSI Steel (Thailand) re-opened it in February 2011 to make steel for India.

Tata is now reviewing its steel operations in Europe, not because they are unprofitable but because it will be able to make more profit in India.

Foreign-owned companies do provide employment for British workers, pay their rates and taxes (?) but the profits go to the parent company abroad.

In general though they only export to a limited market. An exception is the British (all foreign-owned) car industry. If Siemens does build wind turbine electricity generators, they will only be for the North Sea wind farms. When these are built it will revert to maintenance only.

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Where are all the British innovators and entrepreneurs of past years? They’re probably downhearted through a very long time of no interest in manufacturing by successive governments.

Fatal flaw in wind power

From: Ian W Murdoch, Spring Hill, Welbury, Northallerton, North Yorkshire.

I MUST comment on the letter from Melvyn Walker (Yorkshire Post, May 27), particularly his assertion that wind-generated electricity supplied the UK with 12.5 per cent of its energy needs. I’m not sure where he obtained this so-called fact and can only assume that he has been fooled by the constant flow of propaganda from the wind lobby, aided by the DECC.

There is a clear source of accurate data on the contribution which wind energy makes to the UK’s electricity demand every half hour on the National Grid’s web site, which contradicts the 12.5 per cent figure, as detailed below.

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At this time of year, the demand met by the Grid averaged over a week is about 33,500MW, so if wind met 12.5 per cent of this demand, it would be providing 4,187MW. However, there is only 7,136MW of wind capacity metered by the Grid, and so the wind capacity would have to operate at a constant 58.6 per cent load factor – about twice the load factor claimed by the wind lobby.

The reality is that over the last 12 months, wind has contributed an average of 4.75 per cent of the UK’s electricity needs.

All the figures above are 
average figures, which totally cover up the fatal flaw in regarding wind as an effective and reliable renewable contributor to the UK’s energy needs – its natural intermittency.