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		Letter to the Editor Leicester Mercury - Wednesday, 24th January 2007 Dear Sir, Collis Gretton (Mailbox, 2nd January) is looking at the euro through rose-coloured glasses. If the euro is "the high point for the EU", then heaven help us. We already have a dangerous house-price boom in the UK. If we joined the euro, we should be stuck with a lower interest rate, and inflation would run out of control. Meantime the euro-zone itself is dividing into North and South areas. In the South, interest rates are too low and inflation stalks. In the North, especially Germany, the same interest rate is too high, and will stall growth. Italy in particular is facing a serious crisis within the euro-zone. Its price competitiveness against Germany has slipped by 30% since the euro was launched, and there is nothing it can do about it. Serious economic commentators are asking how long it can stand the pain. Gretton refers to "what (EU) membership has done for Ireland", as though it were self-evident. Indeed Ireland has benefited from net fund transfers from Brussels (ironically, at about the same level as the UK's net transfers into the EU -- we might just as well have sent Dublin a cheque). But far bigger factors have been US investment in Ireland (pro rata, Ireland gets more US investment than any other member-state); the period when it floated its currency (growth has slowed since it joined the euro); and especially its very competitive corporate tax rates -- a lesson that Gordon Brown needs to learn. Roger Helmer Conservative MEP for Leicestershire