LETTER:Tony Blair: New Age Tory

From Mr Michael J. O'Donoghue

Sir: I feel, as a life-long Labour Party supporter living in a Tory heartland, profoundly depressed. Mr Blair's admiration of Margaret Thatcher, his stance on education, and to a lesser extent, health, not to mention nationalisation, smacks not of political philosophy, but political plagiarism.

His trip to sup with the "great satan" in Hayman Island, I am afraid, confirms a rather unwholesome image. In wartime even Churchill felt constrained to sit down with the people whom he despised; however, in peacetime?

When I vote I ask myself the question whether it is a pro-vote for my party or an anti-vote because I dislike the others so much. Voting Labour in East Sussex, for me has had to be a matter of complete principle, rather than practice, knowing my party cannot win the seat. Soon it seems this question may be redundant as politics is becoming more androgynous.

Sadly, I see Mr Blair not so much as a New Age Socialist, but rather as a New Age Tory, and therefore, sadly, I shall be staying at home on polling day.

Yours sincerely,

M. J. O'Donoghue

Peasmarsh, East Sussex

17 July