REGARDING your editorial (LET, April 15) on perceptions of 'new' Labour and whether the party has changed, don't you think that most of the alarm is not only foolish, but also blown out of all proportion?
Take Rodney Bickerstaffe and Roy Hattersley, supposedly uncovering Tony Blair's 'extremist' past - no one need be scared. Such spectres are usually in Tory cupboards, as Sir James Goldsmith and defectors like Emma Nicholson have made clear.
Just as relevant is the fact that most people have followed a line of reasoning that when they were more mature, have approached problems from a different angle and with a better balanced view - like Tony Blair has done.
On Clare Short's tax 'gaffe,' in a democracy and in Labour, she has a right to express her view on tax-and-spend subjects, although, as we know, they are not party policy.
But I had to laugh at Conservative chairman Dr Brian Mawhinney, whose bungled attempts to blacken the Labour Party and Tony Blair are so ridiculous - especially in view of his party's hikes in indirect tax.
DUNCAN McVEE, Robin Bank Road, Darwen.
Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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