Readers' letters - May 13

Is it possible to go back to the future, and could we really turn back time, or is this just part of Hollywood or a song by Cher? Is our love of nostalgic television programmes showing people ballroom dancing, baking and displaying various degrees of talent clouding our judgement? Was life in the 1950s and 60s happier than today, and were we better off when we did not have much?

Was Harold Macmillan right to say in 1957 that Britons have never had it so good?

Was Harold Wilson right to say that devaluation does not mean that the pound in your pocket has been devalued?

Would we want to go back to an era when an elite group of Eton public schoolboys, like Eden, Macmillan and Home, governed us (or have some things in life never changed)?

Would we miss colourful European football managers such as Jose Mourinho?

Are we more interested in the shape of a cucumber or the price of one?

Why is it that only political opportunists, extremists and people over the age of 65 are anti-Europe, is it a case of they do not have much to lose?

Nostalgia is defined as ‘a sentimental yearning for the past’.

Are we to go forward to the future or backwards to the past?

Stephen Bennett

via email

EUROPE

EU increases hostility

Far from being a cause of peace, the European Union has increased hostility in Europe.

Ultimately it is a lack of democracy that leads to war and conflict.

The EU’s crushing of democracy in Greece has led to the rise of extreme parties such as Golden Dawn.

Does Mr Cameron really think the violent clashes in Athens represent peace?

Are you really telling me that Cameron was willing to risk World War Three if we didn’t get some minor change to migrant benefits, then?

This is laughable.

How low will the Prime Minister and the Britain Stronger in Europe campaign go to keep us in this failed political union?

If we ‘Remain’ in the EU we will be locked inside a failed project that is pushing towards closer fiscal, political and military union, no matter the pain and suffering it brings to the people of Europe.

Steven Woolfe MEP

europe

Looking silly if we leave

The EU is the world’s largest trading block and, by a huge margin, it will remain our largest trading partner whatever the referendum result.

To vote to leave would be like shooting ourselves in the foot. It will leave Britain weaker not stronger, isolated not independent.

It was British representatives who took the lead in creating the EU single market.

It boosts trade by setting common rules for almost everything we buy and sell. European standards often become adopted as world standards. Our people are involved in shaping these rules.

By and large we put forward good ideas that win support.

Mostly we get our way. You don’t get more say over the policies that will affect you if you are not in the room where the decisions are made.

If we leave the EU, we shall have to follow the rules set by others.

That will not increase our sovereignty, it will just leave us with a bleeding foot, looking stupid.

Chris Davies

North West Liberal Democrats