The profligate EU has no moral authority to force an exit fee on Britain

SIR – The EU’s posturing over Brexit, and its claim that Britain will need to pay billions of pounds to settle its debts, borders on laughable. It also illustrates the EU’s hostile attitude to any state that stands up to it.

No organisation has a right to be profligate when its income has taken a downward turn. It’s well and truly time that the EU started practising what it preaches: austerity.

Not being able to do so takes away any moral authority it has to impose austerity on its own members. Mike Carrivick Wokingham, Berkshire

SIR – Much has been made of the inability of the EU’s auditors to provide a set of “true and fair” accounts, yet Brussels alleges we owe £60 billion.

How would they know? Richard Youens Pewsey, Wiltshire

SIR – If the EU can’t afford to survive, it should a) disband or b) get Germany to pay extra. After all, Germany has a famous cash surplus, and the EU is run for its benefit. Harry Brooks Arkley, Hertfordshire

SIR – If the EU expects Britain to pay billions in order to leave, then I am boycotting EU products.

The only pain will be not drinking French wine. However, there are some very good English alternatives – Nyetimber instead of champagne and Sharpham instead of French white. I’ve just got to find a good red, although English craft beer and farmhouse cider go with most foods. Michael Banyard Charlton Adam, Somerset

SIR – The endless discussion concerning the economic effects of Brexit is missing the point.

While such issues are important, it was the prospect of restoring full democracy, and ending interference in judicial matters by politicised European courts, that motivated most Leavers. Financial arrangements can be changed over the years – but, once lost, national sovereignty would probably be gone forever. Colin Bullen Tonbridge, Kent

SIR – If, after three months of EU demands, it becomes obvious that no deal will be possible, can’t Britain just leave – thus saving millions of pounds in negotiators and lawyers’ fees? Steve Sanford Lincoln

SIR – “Make a decision, right or wrong” may have been good advice to me as a young platoon commander but, reflecting on the complexity of Brexit, I prefer Labour’s honest incoherence to the arrogant certainty of Theresa May and the Conservatives.

That certainty is a mask, and I suspect that, in our poker game with the EU, we have no aces to play and are left with our jokers – Johnson, Davis and Fox – all out on the table. Simon Diggins Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire