I FEEL I must take issue with Paul Hart’s comment about “that une - lected gaggle of bureaucrats who lord it in Brussels”.

I assume Paul is referring to the European Commission because the European Council, the Council of the European Union and the Euro - pean Parliament are all elected, either directly or indirectly by all EU citizens.

Bureaucrats work in bureaucracies which, according to one dictionary, are a body of non-elected government officials, a government characterised by specialization of functions, adherence to fixed rules, and a hierarchy of authority, or a system of administration marked by officialise and red tape.

Well, knock me down with a goose feather, but we have just such a gaggle in Maldon, in Chelmsford and in Westminster.

In the UK, they are called (among other things) local government officers and civil servants.

Here’s the thing, Paul.

Neither you nor I, nor anyone else on the UK electoral register voted for them.

And no one on the electoral register of any EU country voted for the Brussel’s gaggle either.

Just like our own, local gaggles, they are appointed. Many of them are British.

Incidentally, we don’t vote for the judiciary, British or EU, either; all judges are unelected.

As to lording it in Brussels, Paul might not be aware that EU member states have very considerable control over their own laws.

The Netherlands has legalised cannabis; euthanasia is legal in Belgium; Sunday trading is legal in the UK; the French have toll motorways. The list goes on.

Wikipedia is a good place to start research into what the EU is and how it works.

But it’s complicated. Just like any form of modern government.

Stuart Condie, Suffolk Road, Maldon