A couple of weeks ago, I wrote in a blog entry that I'd noticed from a recent Parliament publication that UKIP don't have a representative on the Environment Committee. I went on to bemoan UKIP's inactivity in the European Parliament, especially in such a crucial area of legislation.

A week or so later, I received an undated letter on blank notepaper with no address, but which appears to have come from Tom Wise, a UKIP MEP. It complains that my blog entry on 15 November was inaccurate - in fact, that I "based the whole entry on incorrect information".

I found this rather odd. As I wrote at the time, my claim was based on an official publication of the European Parliament Information Office in London (to whose website I provided a link) on the work of the Environment committee. This publication gives a full list of UK members and I observed that there are no fewer than 13 members from the three main parties, plus the Greens, Plaid Cymru and even Sinn Fein - but not a single member from UKIP.

However, I now find that since this booklet was published (only three months ago), UKIP has taken measures to ensure that there is now one UKIP member on the relevant committee - still not a full member, but a substitute - namely Mr Wise. No doubt this is as a result of the embarrassment caused by Parliament’s publication - the timing is too significant to be regarded as a coincidence.

However, all is still not entirely well. I also note that, according to the minutes of the Environment Committee placed on Parliament’s web site (click here - scroll to page 14 of this document for a list of MEPs who attended), Mr Wise has not attended a single meeting of the committee, despite having put himself forward as a substitute member! (Unless, again, he has done so very recently, since the most recently available minutes.)

Any joy I may have in seeing UKIP MEPs finally beginning to do some work in this Parliament by taking up a place on a committee is somewhat tempered by the fact that this membership appears not to be an active one!

I have written back to Mr Wise, clarifying this and suggesting that he withdraws his allegations about how "misleading" he finds my blog entry. In fact, I rather think it is his protestations that more accurately fall under the category of "misleading"!