RE the debate about whether the Thatcher government of the 1980s was responsible for the creation of the modern yob.

I will be 55 next birthday and don't want to go back to the Thatcher years. The current Labour Government is too much like the Thatcher government for my liking.

But the yob culture was already well established long before the Tories under Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979. There was concern about rising crime throughout the 1960s.

There was a falling crime rate in the early 1950s, but this didn't last.

I think the coming of rock and roll and major disturbances pushed up the crime rate by the late 1950s.

Things have been made worse today by the emphasis on children's rights. Children are taught to view adults as potential abusers who they have rights against.

In decades past, the teacher, doctor and parent had power to decide what children did and what was best for them. Children and young people today are given the impression they can be abusive to older people, and people in authority, and not suffer any consequences.

Peter J Brown, Middlesbrough.