WHEN a UKIP supporter quotes figures, I always look for my salt cellar and take a large pinch.

I remember their threat that 29 million Bulgarians and Romanians were queuing up to come to Britain to live off benefits, when the entire population of the two countries is only 26 million.

I presumed UKIP were saying that they’d take nine months to get here, as they’d have to stop somewhere on the way to have the three million babies required to make up the shortfall.

Knowing UKIP’s habit of misleading the public with downright lies, I checked out Mr House’s claim that the EU makes 80 per cent of British laws.

According to the House of Commons Library the figure of Acts put in place by our Parliament with EU influence is 10-14 per cent, and regulations influenced by or related to the EU is 9-14 per cent.

That means Mr House is claiming a figure six or seven times the true one. That’s quite an exaggeration, even for him.

These laws are, of course, debated in the European Parliament, consisting of 751 members freely elected by the member countries and of whom 78 represent Britain. Having studied the Soviet system used in Communist Russia for both my degrees, I can assure readers that it was totally different both in concept and the way it operated (and, by the way, the Russians don’t use it nowadays and have a parliamentary system). Thus the second part of Mr House’s rant disappears down the plughole the moment you look at the facts.

Doesn’t leave much of his house of cards standing, does it?

Case dismissed, I think.

MARTIN KYRLE, Chandler’s Ford.