Jeremy Hunt calls for optimism while his party drives voters to despair
SIR – Jeremy Hunt (“The Right of our party is talking the UK down and it risks becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy”, May 20) decries the “insidious declinism” of “those who used to be optimists like me”.
It is the Government of which he is part that has overseen this shift. He attempts to put a gloss on what has been a pitiable record since 2019, ignoring the very optimistic voters who put the Conservatives in power to shake up the status quo. Alas, however, the status quo has won.
Philip Hall
Petersfield, Hampshire
SIR – Jeremy Hunt should consider whether the “declinism” to which he refers is, in fact, legitimate despair at the disastrous lockdown, housing, immigration, energy and tax-andspend policies that the Government has pursued for years while pandering to minority woke opinion.
He says that, like “all Conservative governments”, the Tories are taking the “tough decisions necessary to put the economy back on track”. Such measures normally follow a Labour government – but this time the economy has gone off the rails under the watch of a socialist government masquerading as Conservative one.
Tim Coles
Carlton, Bedfordshire
SIR – Jeremy Hunt’s article is indicative of an elite class who are unable or unwilling to accept that anything that goes wrong within their sphere of influence is any fault of theirs.
Before him, the most egregious example of this could be seen in the Bank of England’s position that rampant inflation (more than five times the official target at present) has nothing to do with its loose monetary policies. There are numerous other examples of government and pseudogovernment organisations refusing to take responsibility for their actions.
Mr Hunt (who, we should remember, prepared the NHS less than brilliantly for the Covid pandemic) has presided over a Treasury regime that has stifled any hope of economic growth, with the highest tax burden in 70 years and a blizzard of regulatory red tape that is driving new overseas investment away and killing domestic entrepreneurial activity. This gives little cause for optimism.
Nigel Short
Thurlow, Suffolk
SIR – Rishi Sunak says “most people sitting at home” have “moved beyond judging people by what’s in their bank account” (report, May 20) as they care more about the efforts that he, one of the richest men in Parliament, claims to be making to improve their lives. To me, this merely emphasises how little he understands about poverty today.
Liz Ford
Huntingdon
SIR – It is true that we have “regular opportunities” to get rid of our politicians (Letters, May 20). But how do we get better ones?
Rupert Behrendt
Bingley, West Yorkshire