Treatment of premiers shows up EU’s democractic deficit

IF the point of James Bovington’s letter (Yorkshire Post, November 5) was to convince your readers that EU members still retain their own democratic freedom, then the events of recent days have fatally undermined his argument.

Firstly we saw the Italian premier being treated like an errant schoolboy, when he was told to go away and bring back a revised budget. Then the Greek premier was “summoned” to explain why he wanted to allow his people a referendum to express their opinion about their future. And this is before the proposed intrusive “economic surveillance” powers are operational.

Only an incurable romantic could fail to recognise the “democratic deficit” that so offends the moderate majority in this country.

From: Martin Smith, Main Street, Elvington, York.

SO, according to James Bovington (Yorkshire Post, November 4) “The EU isn’t perfect”, but what is needed are more countries like Poland willing to commit to join the euro.

Sadly this sentiment is all too common for those in denial concerning the looming demise of the single currency.

This purely political and undemocratic experiment has been doomed to end in tears because of the unrealistic timetable – and complete lack of fiscal union.

From: James Bovington, Church Grove, Horsforth, Leeds.

BILL Carmichael is ruining my wife’s weekends (Yorkshire Post, November 4).

I’d promised her that I’d withdraw from the euro debate, having accepted that Britain wouldn’t be joining anytime soon, if ever.

Yet Carmichael’s increasingly hysterical attacks on the European project cannot go unanswered.

I for one will not be apologising to Bill for having supported euro membership for the UK. Your writer states that “euro-fanatics” like me “came within a whisker of ruining our country by dragging it into the euro” with “blinkered zealotry causing untold misery across Europe”.

It is true that there is a problem with some peripheral Eurozone members whose GDP at most accounts for 10 per cent of the euro area.

However have France and Germany, Finland and Austria, Estonia and Slovakia been “ruined” because they use the euro?

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

FOLLOWING the latest clutch of letters from the anti-Europe brigade (Yorkshire Post, November 1), I would like to ask a question more in hope than in expectation of getting an answer.

If our continued membership is so inimical to our interests and withdrawal would unleash a financial bonanza, why don’t the governments, past and present, just cut and run?

If the EU is so unpopular, incompetent and wasteful you would think it’s a no-brainer. Perhaps our rulers have a better grasp of where our true interests lie.