letter to the editor from Richard Corbett MEP

3 December 2004

Bradford Telegraph & Argus

Sir,

P E Bird, your regular anti-EU correspondent, is at it again (letters, 1 December). His strategy is to invent a ‘straw man' argument and then knock it down in an attempt to make pro-Europeans look silly.

He talks about “handing back powers to national governments”, but he knows full well that all decisions that we take at EU level are taken by our own elected governments and elected MEPs. There are no sinister laws imposed on us by distant, unaccountable bureaucrats. In fact, the EU has a level of democratic scrutiny which exists in no other international organisation.

Still, at least the headline to Mr Bird's letter is appropriate. “Confused or what?”.

Richard Corbett MEP (Yorkshire & the Humber)

Labour spokesman on the EU constitution