Yet another letter to the Editor

Ron takes the editor to task!

Dear Ray

Goodness knows I have criticisms of this government, especially of Tony Blair, but I think it was a bit unfair of your editorial to accuse them of manipulating the figures for British deaths in the Tsunami. It seemed that they adopted a policy of limiting the announcements to confirmed deaths whilst admitting that there were others missing. This seems fair enough to me and, as you said, what advantage could they possibly expect to obtain by manipulating the figures?

No doubt it was not deliberate but to sandwich a paragraph mentioning Cumbrian floods, damaging winds and American mud slides between two paragraphs dealing with claimed shortcomings of the government, might result in these paragraphs being linked in the reader's mind.

Like you I do not welcome 24 hour opening times or increased gambling opportunities, and I list those along with many other mistakes this government has made. Nevertheless I cannot agree that this government deserves the adjective 'tragic' any more than many past governments in recent years. They do have some things to be proud of; minimum wage, tax credits, high employment, low interest rates etc. Whatever the rights and wrongs of their actions I do hope that our Village Pump will not get embroiled in election politics as we approach the anticipated election.

Ron Watts

Ron, you are quite right; that was not my intention. The media did however accuse the government of manipulating the numbers to save embarrassing the Prime Minister about his decision not to cut short his holiday. Ray