WHEN Business for Sterling's anti-euro campaign launched in the Eastern Region, including Essex, a year ago this month, most British people thought wrongly that business favoured adoption of the single currency.

A measure of the progress achieved since then is evident from opinion polls which confirm that voters are now aware and appreciate that 80 per cent of businesses across this region believe the euro would be bad for business and bad for jobs.

Since then too the whole concept of the euro has been overtaken by events underlined just before our first anniversary by the publication of a new study on the effects of the Internet on business.

This study answered two of the arguments most commonly used by pro-euro enthusiasts which may well be familiar to readers, the cost of converting currencies (known as transaction costs) and the ability to compare prices easily (called price transparency).

It showed that the Internet has already reduced the transaction costs to just 0.1 per cent of GDP and it is expected to fall further, making this factor far less important than it was 30 years ago when the idea of a single currency was first mooted.

Equally, e-commerce has simplified comparison of currency prices leading to greater global competition, with sophisticated new computer software searching the worldwide web for the cheapest prices and seamlessly converting these into different currencies.

In the modern world of the 21st century, the most important thing for Britain is to remain competitive, retaining control of our own currency and with it our economic destiny.

Adopting the euro would be a backward step.

MARK DIXON,

Essex member,

Business for Sterling East.