Malcolm Glover says that ‘money talks’ (The EU still isn’t listening, Letters, January 5). Indeed it does, but perhaps not in the way Mr. Glover has in mind.

Two statistics bear on this.The EU accounts for 46 per cent of UK exports. But their trade with us accounts for only 8 per cent of total trade within the EU. Mr. Glover writes that the ‘industrial giants of Germany and France will not allow the posturing of Barnier’. But Mr Barnier is negotiating from a strong hand, whilst we negotiate from a weak one. Money can talk in more than one way.

David Martin,

Rosedale Avenue, Acomb, York