'To have Europe as one political entity was the goal of Napoleon, and later Hitler'

SOME might regard PM Gittins' letter as offensive nonsense!

With regard to the last paragraph, anyone who calls these times 'austere' has quite obviously never experienced the real austerity of the 30's,40's,or even the first half of the 50's.

He/she might try talking to someone who lived in those eras about what austerity REALLY was.

With regard to the 'Little Englanders',this is hardly the case of those who either wish to remain,or leave,the E.U. The point is that the original concept of the 'Common Market' ,as it then was, was as a trading area, not as a political entity.

To have Europe as one political entity was the goal of Napoleon, and later Hitler. To want a political system in the UK that is run by our own elected (for better or worse) Parliament, that provides laws and statutes that cannot be overruled by some petty bureaucrat in Brussels, is hardly being a 'Little Englander'.The arguments with regard to staying, or leaving the E.U. are simplistic:they boil down to net gain versus net loss.

To try to argue using statistics can be quite meaningless: as anyone who has studied statistics knows, you can prove virtually whatever you want, provided that you pick the right sample, and the right size of sample. One can prove that a coin always falls 'Heads' if you have a small sample - one, and that was a 'head'!

As to fracking, PMG seems to want to think that anyone in favour of fracking thinks that the opponents are professional layabouts: that may be so. The fact is that those in favour of fracking realise that most of the arguments against it have little scientific value.

The people who know most about the possible ramifications are geologists specialising in subterranean drilling, and chemists(not pharmacists).

Those are the people whose opinions should be respected, not science reporters in newspapers.

David Olliver, Altrincham