“DEVOLUTION” – is this the current buzz-word for “cop-out”, “pass the buck” or, as they say in American political circles, “The Potomac twostep”?

The taxpayer in the UK pays an exorbitant amount of money for 650 MPs and 779 peers in the House of Lords who are there to manage the affairs of the whole UK.

The approximate total annual cost is £500 million for Parliament and £100 million for the House of Lords, to which should be added £72 million for the Scottish Parliament plus the cost of the devolved powers to the Welsh administration. It gets far worse when one adds in our European costs.

Some figures compiled by the Daily Telegraph showed that Britain’s share of running the European bureaucracy brought the total cost of devolved administration to £1 billion per year.

Why, when our MPs are distributed throughout our country, and they are there to represent the interests of the citizens in those areas, should there be any need to further devolve powers as the government is suggesting for Greater Manchester?

As an 86 year-old I remember so well how my hero Winston Churchill treasured his beloved united Britain and I feel he must be turning in his grave the way that this precious isle is disintegrating before our eyes.

Alan Coombe, Portisham Place, Strensall, York.