WILL the Government scrap existing regional assemblies where devolution is rejected, or are we being faced with a Hobson's Choice? The future of the eight English Euro regions, which currently exist, is not made clear.

Should voters reject devolution plans, these unelected regional assemblies, with their offices in Brussels and maintained at taxpayers' expense, will have no mandate to continue in existence.

Or will they sit there, consuming huge sums of public money -- currently £2 million-plus per annum from our North West council tax -- until the electorate can be persuaded to exercise the correct government/EU-approved democratic choice?

North West residents should be told just how long the North West Regional Assembly has been in receipt of council tax money, the figures involved and its use, including the salary of the leader of this appointed-and-approved-by- no-one, North West Regional Assembly.

VAL COWELL, North West press officer, UK Independence Party, Northwood Way, Poulton-le-Fylde.