Michael Stevens, of Orchard Terrace, Lower Contour Road, Kingswear, writes:

In his letter last month, Chronicle, April 1, Michael Sturdee makes a number of statements that require more evidence: ‘to walk away would mean the disintegration of the EU, which would be ­catastrophic for us all’; ‘many countries count on the UK as a counterweight to Germany’; ‘the sorry state of to EU is ­largely Britain’s fault’.

Both sides are guilty of ­making unsubstantiated claims and I hope that I am not doing the same.

I am a Brixet supporter but wish to stay in Europe – that is, the Common Market Europe we voted to join in 1975.

The mainland exports more to us than we export to it. It may be that we would lose three million jobs if all our exports stopped, but the ­mainland would probably lose five million jobs in return.

If it imposed levies on our exports to it, we could do the same. Since their imports are greater we could use our import levies to pay our export levies and still end up with a profit. Do we really think the Continent would be so stupid?

As part of the European Trade Area, we would have to conform to the same conditions as we do now, so there would be no change, except that they would have to do the same for us. I believe we have more stringent controls on the raising of pigs than they do, which means our pig farmers lose out to cheaper imports. We are the most law-abiding country in Europe, with many others being rather lax in meeting EU conditions. I used to think that Germany was very upright until the Volkswagen scandal erupted.

The Eurozone comprises 19 out of the 28 members of the EU, but only Denmark and the UK have a long-term opt out. In time it will be 26 against two – even worse if more join, as a condition would be that they, too, join the euro. We

will be excluded from most ­meetings and not present for most the decision-making. Whatever the claims of our weight of influence, we will not be at the table.

If we vote to leave there will be an immediate clamour from other countries demanding similar benefits. The result will be something similar to the Free Trade Area of 1975, with others reclaiming their own ­sovereignty – as they are already doing over immigration.

We would be doing the whole continent a great favour.