EUROPE: G PARKIN (HAS, Jul 16) asks if we have a government in London and expresses dismay over joining the Common Market in 1973. The answer is yes; we do have a government and we also have a Parliament.

However, the politicians we elect and send to Westminster and the laws and decisions they make have to comply with EU law and policy. This country is in effect governed by Brussels. We are all members of what will soon be a 'European superstate'.

This sorry state of affairs has occurred because our political masters have not been honest with us. For example, when Tony Blair first stood in Sedgefield 20 years ago his election address stated quite clearly that the Common Market has "ruined British jobs and industry''.

The Prime Minister admitted to The Northern Echo's political editor, Chris Lloyd, in an interview to mark his 20 years as an MP in June, that privately he did not agree with the Labour Party policy of leaving the EC in the 1980s. This was an early example of Mr Blair's contempt for honest politics.

Two years ago it was the deceit of the political establishment, in all parties, that motivated me to stand for election and give the voters a real choice. My election address stated that we would be better off out of the EU and, unlike Mr Blair, I said so in private as well as in public. - Chris Williamson, UK Independence Party, Coxhoe.

ROBIN Ashby (HAS, Jul 17) complains about contributors to these columns who point out that the EU is always detrimental; that the authors fail to stand up to the reality test and are 'moaning minnies'.

The reality is that the restructuring funds from the EU, that apparently help so many, originate from money paid to the EU by the Government. British taxpayers get back only some 68 per cent of their contributions from Brussels.

Leaving the EU will not mean ceasing trade with Europe, after all the UK sells more to the EU than we buy from it. Leaving the EU means ceasing to be a part of a political union that interferes with every aspect of our lives by adding to the 68,000 regulations that we have to comply with. The Common Market that Britain joined in 1973 is not the European Union we are now members of.

The small businesses that Mr Ashby feels should be so grateful are probably not writing to the press to express their gratitude since they are groaning under the real weight of bureaucracy that is now accepted as a real barrier to business growth.

The draft EU constitution will, if adopted, fundamentally affect the British people.

Why won't the Government allow a referendum before it is ratified? Now that would be a truly relevant 'reality test' of the British people's commitment to the EU. - Name and address supplied.

WHILST attempting to fill my car with Europe's highest liquid stealth tax the other day, my mind was elsewhere. I suddenly realised that I had been attempting to put diesel in my petrol-guzzling 4x4.

But, fortunately for me, the diesel nozzle did not fit and thus my car engine was not destroyed. So, next time you go and fill your vehicle, spare a thought for the committee of anonymous grey little men that spent hours of their lives hammering out an international standard for the dimensions of filler nozzles and fuel tank filler apertures, all to prevent me and hundreds of thousands like me, contaminating our tanks with diesel.

That is a microcosm of what the European Union is all about, but what we need is a system which will allow us to carry out this unglamorous but vital work, without having to take on board the absurdity of making criminals out of greengrocers who sell bananas by the pound, and closing down A&E departments because the doctors and nurses have been told they can only work 48 hours a week, and causing mayhem in the haulage industry which, because of the above directive, will need 60,000 more drivers.

Other countries around the world seem to manage, and because there are literally thousands of various types of agreements, we simply need an overarching framework to facilitate the conduct of business, and make it fair and accountable.

Does this really need the expense and folly of another Parliament and an unaccountable Commission? - Neil Herron, Sunderland.

ROAD SYSTEM

AS a motorist visiting Darlington three or four times a week, I am very dissatisfied with the state of the surfaces of the main roads into town.

In particular, Grange Road and Yarm Road, both of which are covered with repeated evidence of excavation and repair by public utilities, plus numerous potholes. Total resurfacing is needed.

I also disapprove of the failure of the traffic authorities to provide two-way facilities to the underpass on Geneva Road and the bridge on Thompson Street East.

It is high time that a road sign was placed on the A167 to indicate that the first turning right, after Morton Palms, is an entrance road to Middleton St George.

This road already has a pavement, street lighting, a new housing estate and is even on the 74 bus route. So why not a road sign to indicate this? - Anne Carr, Middleton St George.