EU membership is a drain on our hard earned taxes

DRAIN: Phillip Tinsley has put his finger right on the button with his letter headed Brown Destroys Democracy (The Sentinel, June 27). British taxpayers seem to have no say in the matter as he spends billions in the EU and refuses to give us a referendum on the EU Constitution.

As Mr Tinsley states, we are sick and tired of party politics, and bitterly resent Labour's open-door policy on immigration. We also resent our troops being blown to pieces in wars that cannot be won.

After the 9/11 attacks there might have been some justification for the war in Afghanistan, but this cannot be said of the Iraqi war, which was completely unnecessary.

In any event, where was all the support we should have been getting from our European partners? British and American lives are currently being lost almost daily in Afghanistan, yet troops from other EU countries are virtually conspicuous by their absence.

MEPs appear to do nothing but turn up to claim their £212 daily attendance money. Yet we taxpayers have to fork out £40m a day just to be members of this unelected body in Brussels.

Whatever happened to Gordon Brown's pre-election pledge to abolish means-testing? All Brown, pictured, has done is to give us more of the same, while making his annual £5billion raid on pension funds.

JOHN A WINDRIDGE

Tunstall