Letter: Lack of Euro-vision

Sir: When the entire world's leading economists (let alone the bankers) get everything wrong and we are plunged into chaos in our private lives, with job losses and the evaporation of our savings, when the politicians are unable to agree even in general terms on the best way forward...

In such conditions, given a pound sterling that has not been internally amended or re-valued for over 1,000 years, should we really be discarding it in favour of an unproven new currency in alliance with countries who in some cases have revalued a 100-fold since 1900?

Any stamp or coin collector can remind you that today's French franc was the new name, in the 1960s, for 100 old francs. The German mark in the 1920s was worth a mere one-billionth of the present mark. Our pound, though it will now purchase much less, is still the pound known to the Anglo-Saxons.

Does this track record count for nothing?

ALAN BROAD

Headington, Oxford