GRAHAM Booth MEP declares that he is proud to be a turkey (Proud to be ?a turkey voting for Christmas?, Letters, July 22).

His confession will come as no surprise to the majority of voters in West Devon, who supported pro-European parties in June?s elections. But it will teach the minority who were unwise enough to vote for UKIP a painful lesson: if you vote for a turkey, a turkey is what you get.

At the risk of rubbing their noses in it, may I remind them why the South West needs to be responsibly represented in Europe?

A quarter of a million jobs in our region are directly dependent on exports to the European Union.

We receive £100-million of EU funds each year, supporting projects all over the region. If our voice is not heard, the money and the jobs will go elsewhere.

The same is true of our country?s interests as a whole. Decisions taken by our elected representatives in the European Parliament directly affect our daily lives and our prosperity.

If our representatives refuse to take part in the decision-making process, we can?t complain if we don?t like the decisions.

UKIP members argue that Britain should withdraw from the European Union.

But even if every member of the European Parliament shared this view (which of course they do not) the parliament would still have no power to decide that Britain should withdraw. Only our national parliament in Westminster could do that.

Fortunately, West of England voters had the good sense also to return hard working representatives from three serious parties ? Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat ? so our interests in Europe are not neglected.

Christopher Denne

European Movement (Tamar branch)