IT is interesting to note in many Echo letters the view that leaving the European Union is going to be enormously liberating.

In particular getting out of an EU which may, horror of all horrors, end up a federalist Europe.

But there again, to put another point of view, across the Atlantic is a huge land mass and population of some 50 independent but united "countries".

I refer of course to the United States of America, as made up of staunchly independent states many of which, such as California, Texas, New York, and Florida, with far higher GDPs than the majority of European countries.

And this is the federal USA the most powerful and wealthy country in the world. Not all light and joy, many areas of huge deprivation, but none-the-less per capita income far ahead of all EU countries, including and in particular the UK.

So for my money I don't see how there could be a clearer world beacon showing us all what nations can achieve when they join together in common endeavour. Give up some independent power to gain vastly more collective power, and this in a world of growing alliances and unions.

For me then an enormous tragedy that UK now pulls out of the EU. Forty years of integration now all to be binned on a wacky referendum that didn't even think to build in a safety threshold to get a clear, not highly questionable, mandate from the country.

MARTIN COOPER St Luke's Road, Bournemouth