DAVID Cameron writes in The Echo (Letters, Oct 24), stating that a recent survey of small firms in the North East revealed the real pressures caused by the downturn in the economy, What a cheek.

Here in the North East we cannot forget or forgive "The Thatcher Touch". Margaret Thatcher first came to power in 1979, in Britain we had six million people living below the official poverty line in only eight years Thatcher managed to almost double this to 11.7million. Jobs in manufacturing industry slumped by almost two million.

As an industrial power Britain has been surpassed by all EU countries bar Italy . The former "workshop of the world" has become a nation of bar staff and car park attendants, of messengers and porters, apprentice hairdressers and tele-sales people, security guards and drivers.

These economic conditions were inevitably reflected in the run-down of the social infrastructure. We saw riots in our inner cities, because Thatcher took us into "a slum society." It was estimated that the homeless totalled 250,000, with four million houses not up to minimum standards and another one million simply unfit to live in.

As a result of the economic "restructuring" which lay at the centre of Tory policy, after eight years of Thatcher's leadership Britain become an increasingly divided society, with a sharp and growing cleavage between the affluent South and South East (the main Tory stronghold) and the increasingly run-down areas of the North and West.

So Mr Cameron, please don't try to preach to us. We have in the past been betrayed by a Government of two-nation Tories. We will not be again.
Coun Dianne Snowdon,
Washington Central Ward

It's insulting
DAVID Cameron's letter (Oct 24), has underlined just why this man should never be allowed within 100 miles of 10 Downing Street.
He complains that Gordon Brown is "spending his days on a whirlwind tour of foreign summits" has he not grasped yet that the current economic crisis is a global problem and as such requires a global solution.
David Cameron then sets out his plans for small businesses. The Labour Government has already set out a package of help for small businesses (the first of many, I believe), £350million towards training and skills, faster payments across a wide range of public bodies including health authorities and local councils. Ministers had already announced that Government departments would pay their small suppliers within ten days.
No doubt, Mr Cameron will try to claim all the credit for that, as Thatcher tried to do with Nissan coming to Washington.
His lecture about "economic responsibility and everyone must play their part" is as patronising as it is hypocritical and insulting to the people of Sunderland, Washington and the North East.
How many small businesses in the North East went to the wall during the last Tory government? How many local corner shops and larger stores closed due to money being sucked out of our local economy through massive job losses, how many engineering companies big and small suddenly found their main client base annihilated at a stroke. Where was the Tory "economic responsibility" then?
Bob Price,
Rydal Mount,
Sunderland

Only the start
PETE Bogg (Echo, Oct 16), criticises the Conservative Party for proposing a high-speed rail link from London to Leeds. (That is at least 200 miles further north than the Labour Government's current plans!)
Of course the North East wants to benefit from a high-speed rail link and the sooner the better. I took up this precise point with Stephen Hammond, one of the Party's transport spokesmen, at the recent Conservative Party Conference and he confirmed that the proposed London to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds link was only the start.
Having recently sampled Europe's high speed rail network I look forward to the day when the UK has high-speed links from both London and the channel tunnel to Scotland via both the North East and North West, Wales, Bristol and the South West.
Coun Peter Wood,
Conservative Transport spokesman

Not sustainable
THE contentious issue of residents moving away from this area to other areas, envisaged in the Policy Exchange think tank report, is nothing new.
The population of Sunderland and the North East has been in decline for over 20 years, ever since the demise of coalmining, steel production, shipbuilding and other heavy engineering industries.
Our political leaders may give the impression that they are trying to halt this decline with their policy of "build, build, build". Unfortunately this is not really regeneration it is simply sprucing-up the area.
Either our civic leaders don't understand economic geography or their policies are more about preserving their own numbers than regeneration.
They know that the number of mandatory councillors/Members of Parliament is directly related to population size. What's more, a build, build, build policy is not sustainable and will probably have the opposite effect and hasten the decline.
George Parkin,
Hetton