MIKE Joslin’s letter re Mr Drax was angry and frustrated in tone, but it also had some substance. H. McLaughlin’s response (Echo, May 7) matched the tone but generated more heat than light.

Mr/Ms McLaughlin has yet to meet “a young person who really understands what is happening”. However, his own understanding is so astray that one wonders how he would know. It might be worth pointing out that the US already is a federation in which the separate states have given up significant parts of their sovereignty; the Americans fought a war to maintain this.

We, meanwhile, are concerned with not only a domestic decision but with one that will define or redefine our relations with our allies for the foreseeable future. Just as Mr Cameron felt entitled some time ago to criticise some of Mr Trump’s comments in the US, so the American President (as also very recently the Japanese Prime Minister) is quite entitled to point out some of the possible consequences of our leaving the EU. It is a two-way process that affects not only ourselves.

Similarly, the question of migration is also a two-way process. H. McLaughlin does not bother to disguise his/her xenophobia, but overlooks that well over two million British citizens live and work abroad, the majority in the EU.

Moreover, in the eighties when our own economy was under major strain with three million unemployed, many British workers were grateful for the opportunity to work abroad (remember the TV series Auf Wiedersehen, Pet?).

Our economy now, in the fragile and unstable world of globalised capitalism, is not so secure that we can be sure of never again needing that respite. Poland, in particular, is a major European country of, for historical reasons, vastly untapped potential which is only now being developed; anyone under thirty would be well-advised to value their Polish friends, learn some Polish, and be prepared to move if necessary, hoping that we will still be part of the EU to give them the opportunity.

H McLaughlin’s concluding comments about those of us who remember how things were before the EU are also way off the mark. I am old enough to remember that we joined because we were struggling outside. Moreover, I have also taken sufficient note of the world to realise that a lot has changed since then, and the past is no refuge.

Barry Tempest

Romulus Close

Dorchester