ALL the bleating from John Blunt (LET, May 7) couldn't cover up how green with envy he was over the Labour landslide victory.

So he tried to conjure up some kind of kudos by grovelling to the ghost of Maggie Thatcher, which was intended to take the edge off the achievements of Tony Blair.

Blunt is on record for telling us there was no alternative but to vote Tory, even under John Major.

Yet now he calls them a deservedly-drubbed government that has been thrown out.

Michael Portillo was the man who said that the poll tax would be a vote winner. John Blunt's attack on Portillo for this may be justified, but it is hypocritical because Blunt was a champion of the indefensible poll tax himself. Of course it was a Thatcher government then. Enough said.

J P VERNON, Accrington Road, Blackburn.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.