NEW LABOUR

IN 1997, Tony Blair came to power, boldly declaring that New Labour would clean up politics and return trust to the people.

Now, (with Parliament hounding out of office Elizabeth Filkin, having appointed her as Commissioner for Standards in Parliament in the first place), the most notable feat of New Labour is to have cast politics and politicians even lower in the public esteem than when we finally got rid of the sleazy Tories. A very remarkable achievement.

As a result, we are certain to see another decline in those bothering to vote in the local government elections next May.

With rampant free market economics now the raison d'etre of Government and Oopposition alike, the saddest collection of people is the rump of MPs still holding valiantly to a belief in Old Labour. - B Wennington, Teesside Green Party.

CAR PARKING

IN reply to Audrey Thompson (HAS, Dec 13), surely roads exist to be travelled upon, not to be obstructed.

To prove this, I have had the idea of putting money into the parking meter in my home street on a summer day and then moving the garden furniture into the parking bay to enjoy a leisurely midday meal with friends in the sun.

This would soon be squashed as an "outrageous obstruction", but not if the same space were occupied by a car creating pools of oil drips on the road and making it impossible for the authorities to get at the road surface to keep it clean.

Try renting the same area of space to put, say, a market stall in a public market. This will prove that, in comparison, residential car-owners are over-privileged "spoiled children".

Not content with their home boundaries, they want our streets to look like a car-breakers' yard and to annex the public roadways for little or no rent. Why don't they move to houses with garages and stop complaining about the traffic jams which their own parked vehicles help to create? - E Turnbull, Gosforth.

WAR ON TERRORISM

DIANA Wallis (HAS Dec 12) is nave and irresponsible and, considering her position, should seriously reflect the consequences of her vacuous assertion.

If it was not for such ideological and vague nonsense, the tragic events of September 11 and other atrocities by the al Qaida networks and many others, could have been averted.

This country has a case to answer, for allowing mass murderers and their pay-masters operating from these shores, with what it seems impunity.

Diana Wallis has a very well-paid job and there seems to be a growing army of well-paid jobs, in the name of citizens rights and the rights of those who come here to destroy our very existence.

This has got to stop and the Government has a moral duty to do so and whether we like it or not, those who wish to destroy this nation and its way of life have no rights at all, but the right to face the consequence of their terror and evil.

As for Diana Wallis, she would be better off talking her rubbish to the likes of bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. - J Young, Crook.

I HOPE Mrs Dent (HAS, Dec 12) will forgive me for yet another letter on Afghanistan, but I would like to respond to her charge that I was silent on the Soviet invasion of 1979.

The reason was simply that I was not, at the time, in the habit of writing to The Northern Echo; but it is also relevant that the present war is being waged in my name, by the elected Government of my own country.

For the record, I do condemn the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, as well as the brutal and murderous Russian response to the Chechen problem. I also condemn the actions of the American-armed warlords, now known as the Northern Alliance, who drove out the Russians but then went on to kill 50,000 people in Kabul.

Mrs Dent says I am deriding the West for defending itself. I would support the use of minimum force in self-defence as a last resort; but this is excessive and force used in vengeance, with no serious effort made to bring before a court of law those responsible for the dreadful crimes of September 11, nor to reduce the risk of similar attacks in future. - P Winstanley, Chester-le-Street.

CLEVELAND POLICE

IF Cleveland Police were a commercial company they would surely have been bankrupt or banned by the Government for sheer incompetence. The deputy fails to complete the contract he signed and goes off abroad with a massive sum of money to a well-paid job; Ray Mallon and others are suspended for years on full pay with no criminal activities proven.

A car belonging to an officer is captured on camera breaking the speed limit, but the officer has a lapse of memory and cannot remember who the driver was (with such a memory should he be holding a high rank while fighting crime?).

There is now a 39-year-old drunken driver who, after serving a jail sentence, is going to cost the taxpayer and ratepayers £500,000.

Respect for the police in Cleveland must be around zero. - E Reynolds, Wheatley Hill.