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UNDER the headline "Labour councillors attacked for deal with Tories" (Echo, May 24), you report that the regional and national Labour Party officers were dissatisfied that Labour councillors would only occupy four of the eight cabinet positions after being the biggest party, with 22 seats, after the Stockton Borough Council election.

It is only because the other three minority groups refused to work with Labour in a rainbow coalition that the Conservative, leader Ken Lupton, negotiated a power-sharing Conservative-Labour coalition to run Stockton council.

If there was to be proportionate representation with Labour winning 22 of the 56 seats, they could only expect to occupy at the most three of the eight cabinet seats.

It is in the Labour group's best interest to make this coalition with the Conservatives work successfully for the next four years, because the only alternative will be to exclude Labour from the Cabinet altogether, and for the other four groups to form a coalition to run Stockton council.

I wonder what the regional and national party officers of the Labour Party would think about that? - Keith Dewison, Billingham.