From Selwyn Courties

SIR. I write having read the recent anti-European letters in your newspaper.

Britain is, as part of the EU, enjoying an unparalleled period of peace with our neighbours, progress and prosperity.

The question anti-Europeans have to answer is how are they going to get us from here to where they would like to start their journey? And then, where would their journey take us?

Leaving the EU means breaking five treaties.

Each one took ages to negotiate, so a "quickie" amicable divorce is out of the question.

The rest of the EU would feel badly let down and hardly bend over backwards to give us easy terms.

At best they might offer something like the arrangement with Norway access to the EU's market but subject to EU law, with no say in its making. Hardly the sort of independence' that anti-Europeans crave.

When challenged as being anti-European, they usually say they have no problem with the rest of Europe only with Britain's membership. However, as a good exit deal for Britain would not be negotiable while the EU exists, their only strategy must be to try to wreck the whole EU first.

A great recipe for continued peace and prosperity, and nice pickings for the remaining, and emerging, big powers in the world. All in the name of patriotism?

SELWYN COURTIES Blundel Lane Stoke D'Abernon