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		Carbon debt of the Strasbourg commute Lincolnshire Echo - Friday, 2nd March 2007 Dear Sir  Your article of Feb 15th criticises Lincolnshire MPs for "producing 11 tons of CO2 emissions" last year.  I'd like to know how they were supposed to do their jobs without driving to constituency events.  As an MEP covering six counties, I drive around 25,000 miles a year, and I estimate that 90% of that is directly related to my work.  In any case 11 tons is a paltry amount compared to the 190,000 tons a year produced by the European parliament's lunatic commuting once a month between Brussels and Strasbourg.  Unlike the miles clocked up by our hard-working MPs, the Strasbourg commute is entirely useless and pointless.  It also costs the taxpayer around £130 million pounds a year -- wasted.  But the second seat for the parliament stands as a metaphor for the whole of the EU project.  It is riddled with policies and programmes that no one can justify, no sane man can defend -- but which no one can change.  Roger Helmer Conservative MEP for Lincolnshire