You shouldn’t snipe without giving facts

JOHN Brown (“Just as many failings with other parties,” Mailbox, April 29) promotes the Tory line that all politicians are “as bad as each other”.

They are not. There is no comparison between the governments of the Blair years and the utter mess and catastrophe meted out on our nation by Tory governments since 2010.

Mr Brown states that people writing here have “invented” failures the Tories. Let him state what he thinks is invented. What is he talking about?

It is unacceptable in these columns to snipe without evidence.

He states that Labour wanted to “lock down longer” (Covid). Well, what an awful party wanting to save lives! Better Labour than Sunak and his “Eat out to Spread the Virus” gimmick.

After all the waste, cronyism and hypocrisy of the government in this benighted saga, somehow, somehow, it’s Labour’s fault!

Mr Brown needs to acquaint himself with the facts if he is concerned with the national finances. National debt has nigh on trebled since 2010. And the really big hit has been Brexit, a self-imposed virus, not Corona. The Office for Budget Responsibility has calculated that Brexit will hit the economy twice as hard as Covid.

The energy crisis is also apparently Labour’s fault. No, it isn’t. Labour largely opposed Brexit which was a major cause in the schism in the European continent and which led to its weakening and Putin’s invasion in Ukraine, which led to the energy crisis. A Tory cause, not Labour’s.

Mr Brown draws a false equivalence on sleaze between the two major parties without mentioning any.

So, Mr Brown, let’s remedy the situation in relation to this parliament – for the Tories (those who have lost the whip) – Hancock, Stewart, Bridgen, Knight, Roberts, Blunt, Wragg, Menzies and Pincher. Labour has withdrawn the whip in a number of instances but the majority (eg Corbyn and Abbott) have been suspended largely for taking a political stance. There is absolutely no equivalence here.

Mr Brown states “some have even gone to prison”. He should state who this is? I don’t think there is one.

The Tories have wrecked the economy and the political system has collapsed with five prime ministers. We have had the utter chaos and corruption of Johnson and the lunacy of Truss, but the elephant in the room not dealt with by Mr Brown is the steady creep towards authoritarianism. This is far more worrying.

There has been much written about this creep – the use of slogans and symbolism (Get Brexit Done), the disregard for human rights (Let’s pull out of the ECHR), the confection of a “common enemy” (the EU), the control by the media (right wing press), the suppression of voters (identification requirements), the disregard for experts (“enough of them”) and academics, the rampant cronyism.

Even if people agree with Mr Brown they should nevertheless fear the terrifying direction the Tories are taking this country.

This is no benign old-fashioned, good to honest Tory Party of the likes of Churchill, Macmillan, Heath and Major.

This is a seriously destructive nasty force within our society, without a shred of decency and bent on self-interest, exploitation and the destruction of our great nation and its institutions.

All those who are true patriots will want to see them consigned to utter electoral oblivion.

This begins today.

Dr Andrew Golland, Leicester