Letter: Britain in Europe

Sir: Warwick Cairns really struck a chord (letter, 18 June). Britons are largely ignorant of other European countries. But through my experience of working for a company which manufactures and trades throughout Europe, North and South America and Asia I can tell him that this is true also of the population of all other European countries, America and Asia. This is only natural, since most countries are defined by their language and common cultural experiences which they mostly do not share with others.

There are two points here to be made: 1) Britons are not unique in their profound lack of knowledge of other countries in Europe; 2) if the EU governments continue to pretend that all is well and that EU institutions are not in need of major reform, we are heading for disaster.

My proposal would be to abolish the European Parliament and scale back the European Commission to a level where it could function as some kind of coordinating force between the various national civil services. The European Commission must really be stopped from acting as the quasi-government of Europe.

MARTIN HOMMEL

Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire