Not an issue

In a letter to The Times today, Dr Simon Morgan recalls a lecture series on EEC membership in the winter of 1961-62.

In so doing, he brings up the old canard about "warnings of loss of national identity", which, he says, were as vociferous in 1961 as they are today. "Perhaps theirs was a particularly delicate flower, but the roses, thistles, leeks and shamrocks still seem quite distinct to me," he writes.

Why the Europhiles continue to bring this up defeats me. The obvious response is to ask whether the French were any less French in June 1940, compared with a month previously?

Frankly, "national identity" is not an issue to serious Eurosceptics. What does matter is who governs us. And while many of us have very little time for TB, he does at least have one great merit. We can get rid of him - and perhaps sooner than we thought.