“Brixham Coastguard covers an area of coastline from Topsham, a part of Exeter on the river Exe, across Torbay and on to Dodman Point near Mevagissey in Cornwall.

But the Brixham station is due to be closed as part of a reorganisation programme and ultimately EU directives will enable one centralised coastguard control station to cover the whole of Britain.

The new centre might be located in South Wales, possibly at Milford Haven or Swansea. But being almost totally dependent on communications technology could be sited almost anywhere including Cherbourg on the opposite of the English Channel.

Whatever the case an obvious disadvantage will be the loss of local knowledge which plays such a vital role in the present set up.

Importantly, previous attempts to centralise rescue services have ended up as costly failures.

Any reorganisation of the Coastguard service need not occur in the way proposed and simply paves the way for the EU to further subtract from the British way of life.

David Smith, Exeter.”

By DavidEU