It becomes clearer by the day that EU values are our values | The big issue

David Miliband is right to say that the European Union “is the team we should be in” (“Tory Brexit policy is chaotic”, Opinion). The nearer we come to Brexit, the more this is clear to all.

As Miliband argues, we see that EU values are our values: human rights, democratic freedoms and the rule of law. There are other concerns that also speak for Britain.

We hear that a new customs arrangement is being sought with free access across borders to facilitate trading: does this seem strangely familiar?

We hear that an open border is being negotiated between Ireland and Northern Ireland to keep people and traffic moving: what already exists? I wonder. We hear that we are running out of skilled workers and will need to recruit from other countries; even free movement has been mentioned: what happened to pulling up the drawbridge?

We hear that whistling in the dark is our considered response to settling our outstanding debts to the EU; whatever happened to all that money coming back the other way?

An end to this nonsense. It is becoming clear, even to diehard Leavers, that what already exists, and what we believe in, is what is best for Britain and that is why we belong to the EU. Why are we jumping through all these hoops to end up where we started out?

It might be time to think again. The writing is on the wall.
Canon David Eaton
Betchworth
Surrey

Articles by David Miliband, Anne McElvoy (“Remainers will get nowhere…”, Comment) and William Keegan (“We helped save Europe…”, Business) last week gave some cause to hope that there may be ways of averting the impending disaster for the country because of the Brexit vote.

The self-inflicted chaos, confusion and uncertainty are affecting the economy, trade, finance, health service, national security, democratic values and co-operation with other EU countries and reflect the lack of sufficient and true information given to the voters to enable some degree of an informed decision.

The majority of MPs voted to stay in the EU. A massive and urgent wake-up call is needed. Come back, David Miliband, your country needs you!
Claire Stonehouse
Ashill
Norfolk

In his book Socialism For a Sceptical Age (1994), Ralph Miliband wrote: “The fact of class struggle on an international scale inexorably points to the need for a socialist government to preserve as large a measure of independence as is possible. Notwithstanding the globalisation of capital and the ever greater interdependence of nations, the nation-state must remain for the foreseeable future the crucial point of reference for the left.”

Ralph Miliband was a serious political thinker. What is most perplexing about the articles by his son is the refusal to address the analysis of globalisation and the European Union’s single market put forward by his father.
Ivor Morgan
Lincoln

The Brexiters proclaim that it would be undemocratic to allow us to have a say once negotiations are complete. Yet it is only once the terms and conditions are known that a rational decision can be made. Such a decision should not be left to MPs who, by all accounts, were taken by surprise by the result last year. Voters should be given the chance to decide based on reality, not speculation.
Michael Owen
Eastbourne

David Miliband articulately rehearses the economic and social arguments of the Remain camp, but these arguments were tested and rejected in the referendum. If he is the knight in shining armour for those wishing to remain in the EU, he will need to develop a persuasive vision for those who feel left behind by globalisation and anxious about what they see as the erosion of democracy by the EU.
David Candlin
Thames Ditton, Surrey