Editorial Comment and Simon Heffer:

SIR – By repeatedly claiming that her Brexit deal is good for Britain, and that it delivers on the referendum result, Theresa May has demonstrated that she is either in a state of serious self-delusion or is deliberately trying to deceive us.

Her unwillingness to divulge the full text of the Attorney General’s legal opinion until she was forced to do so by Parliament leads me to think that she is trying to pull off a confidence trick of monumental proportions. I hope and pray that our MPs don’t fall for it. Frank Tomlin

Billericay, Essex

SIR – All Mrs May is doing is renegotiating our EU membership and calling it Brexit. Jeannette Dennis

Fareham, Hampshire

SIR – Liam Fox, the International Trade Secretary (Comment, December 2), argues that Mrs May’s deal is “imperfect” but the best we can get. He says it will ensure that we leave the EU on March 29, to take back control of our destiny.

It will do nothing of the sort. Dr Fox himself makes the rather obvious point that “the exact path of our exit is not quite certain.” In reality, Parliament is about to vote on half a deal, with the other half still to be concluded. It’s a bit like someone buying a house and giving a nonrefundable deposit of £39 billion before conducting any searches. Has Dr Fox forgotten that two Brexit secretaries have resigned over this?

The deal is a sell-out and surrender. In her Lancaster House speech, Mrs May promised a golden Brexit. Dr Fox is asking people to support a fool’s gold Brexit. People throughout the country, on both sides of the debate, are genuinely angry. And it has not gone unnoticed that it’s a Conservative Cabinet that has allowed Mrs May to carry out this betrayal – and is, unbelievably, still in support of her. Eddie Hooper

Gravesend, Kent SIR – Philip Hammond says we should support Mrs May’s “deal” in order to heal our “fractured society”.

On what planet can 650 people imposing on 17 million others the direct opposite of what they have repeatedly promised them possibly result in healing? Neil Harvey London SE8 SIR – Shinzo Abe, the Japanese prime minister, has done us no favours by telling Theresa May to avoid at all costs a no-deal exit from the EU (report, December 2). He should read Daniel Hannan’s article (December 2), which so clinically puts to the sword the claims of the no-deal doom-mongers, and which outlines so clearly the benefits to Britain from such a deal.

It occurs to me that few if any of today’s businessmen or politicians have any first-hand knowledge of commercial life before 1974. I am long retired, but my own experience encompassed selling British-made engineering products to Europe and the rest of the world for nearly 20 years before we joined the EEC. It was not so bad, you know. Yes, there was paperwork, but it was all part of the normal workload, and there was a thriving community of customs and forwarding agents to help smaller businesses without their own facilities.

There were also tariffs – but that is a two-way trade, the impact of which can be minimised when it is in the interests of both sides. And let us not forget that, while there are exceptions, the average tariff in trading on World Trade Organisation rules is nowadays a little over 1 per cent.

Still, in those pre-EEC days, no Dutch flowers wilted on the dock-side, and imports from Europe of fruit and vegetables arrived as fresh as pre-1974 transport facilities allowed. There were hold-ups now and again at Calais, but that was nothing to do with trade rules, and the attitude of French dockers has changed not a whit in the past 44 years. Derek Latham

Ayton, North Yorkshire