Don’t give Gove a sniff of the PM job
■ Michael Gove’s admission that he took a Class A drug has cast a shadow over his bid to become PM. If he’d not thrown his hat into the ring in the leadership race, this may have never surfaced.
Politicians are like the rest of us, human, and as such can make mistakes in their private life, but the public will find it difficult to forgive such an error of judgement.
The misery drugs can cause through addiction cannot be overstated. Gove should search his conscience about whether he is a suitable candidate for the highest office in the land.
Michael Smith, Chatham, Kent
■ These so-called pillars of society who hold the highest positions in government think they can put their tarnished pasts behind them and preach the right and wrongs of decency in public life.
But Michael Gove’s cocaine admission is the final straw and I think the public now just wants this government to stand down with whatever sense of dignity they have left. We should decide who is to be the next prime minister, not just the Tory elite.
Reg Barrett Southminster
Essex
■ Many of the politicians lining up for the job of PM admit to having taken drugs in the past and seem to think of it as a rite of passage that doesn’t matter. What other skeletons do they have hidden, I wonder? We have seen recently a Labour MP losing her job because she lied about a speeding offence, and at least one of the main contenders for the Tory leadership has confessed to taking cocaine.
Britain will be seen as a country with no morals, not to be trusted. Terry Bennett, Blackpool
■ Until reading the excellent article by Julie McCaffrey (Mirror, June 10), I was unaware of the worldwide consequences of cocaine. Michael Gove’s admission that he used this Class A drug, the BBC axing the free TV licence for older senior citizens, and years of misery from austerity polices have sealed the fate of the Tory Party at the next general election.
James E Reay, Workington, Cumbria
■ How depressing that after the cocaine revelations about Michael Gove, Boris Johnson is now odds-on favourite to be the next PM.
Do we really want this incompetent, lazy, self-serving man running the country?
Michael Heseltine summed him up perfectly as the sort of man who waits to see which way the crowd is running, then dashes ahead saying “Follow me”!
Gordon Pilkington Epsom, Surrey
■ Has Michael Gove come clean because he really does regret his illegal drug use, or because the revelation was about to be exposed in a new biography?
He must think the British public are stupid.
Keith Baty, Carlisle
■ Would Michael Gove get into the police after the admission that he took a Class A substance? I don’t think so.
Nor should he be in the running to become our next prime minister. Douglas Higgins, Liverpool