letter to the editor from Richard Corbett MEP

3 March 2006

Guardian

Sir,

So, Lee Rotherham (letter, 3 March) and others think that the Conservative MEPs should not sit with the centre-right EPP because some (though by no means all) of its member parties are too integrationist for their liking. Instead, they would prefer them to sit with assorted fringe parties with reputations for racism, homophobia, extreme nationalism and opposition to equality for women.

What does this tell us about the modern Tory party? That it has become so obsessive about Europe that it prefers to work with extremist parties that share its hostility to Europe than to work with  moderate parties that don't completey agree with it on that one issue.

So much for David Cameron's attempts to moderate the Conservative party!

Richard Corbett
Labour MEP for Yorkshire & the Humber