SIR - Mike Parkes (Monday, December 19) insists that the Prime Minister should have been resolute in demanding reform to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) before agreeing to trade away a chunk of our rebate.
This was never going to be possible, because of a blunder the Prime Minister made three years earlier. Back in 2002, Blair signed up to a deal that confirmed there would be no change to the CAP until 2013 at the earliest. He had absolutely no need to do this - any country could have vetoed the deal. Instead he chose to give in to be nice to the French. It was a huge and costly error.
All this bluster in recent days about getting a 'review' in 2008 is therefore simply spin for the Press. The CAP is set in stone for the next eight years at least, and it was Blair himself who set it. The French have a word for the Prime Minister's recent performance - it is a 'charade'.
PHILIP BUSHILL-MATTHEWS,
MEP European Parliament
(and Conservative Office, Sansome Place, Worcester).
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