I AGREE with TJ Rider on Teflon Tony's lack of achievement (Letters, February 23). Let me add one, hospital waiting lists. Does anybody think they have got better?

On crime, who feels safer than they did seven years ago? Recently we have read of a man beaten to death in Micklegate, another was found dying in the street and nobody knows what happened to him. Two people have been beaten to death in Gillygate. Every night the Evening Press carries accounts of more violence.

Shootings in Leeds have become so common it has now joined the ever-growing league of 'Bang Bang Cities' in this country.

And what does our Home Secretary David Blunder-kett say about the present state of affairs? He says he wants another term in office to reverse the trend.

Those who believe him should take one step forward while the rest of us hurry off home and start building our concrete bunkers.

Jeremy D Fox,

Malton Avenue,

York.

...I HEARTILY support TJ Ryder's views regarding this personification of incompetence, in other words the Labour Government, (letters, February 23).

What an appalling record of broken promises.

"Tough on crime" - what a joke. Even York is getting like Dodge City. NHS - more managers than beds, but thank God for the nurses and doctors, and the dental service, whew!

War on Iraq - enough said. Immigration - a shambles. Education - struggling. Council taxes and pensions - a tragedy.

However, you will note that the first thing this Government did was to award themselves a whacking pay increase, and later negotiate for themselves the most generous pension scheme in the country. Sadly, it goes on.

I think the words penned by Shakespeare may well have been written for Tony Blair: "Vows are but breath, and breath a vapour is".

The joke is I voted Labour (never again) hoping their promises would be fulfilled. I didn't suspect Tony Blair would see himself as a world statesman. So, the sooner he "struts and frets his hour on the stage and then is heard no more" the better.

Oh! I have just had a terrible thought. If Tony goes does will that mean 'Two Jags' Prescott will take over. He who spends so much time abroad 'fact finding' and snorkelling, then returns in a permanent state of jet lag, coupled with a touch of the 'bends'.

Please Mrs Finch, (Letters, February 19) tell me which pills you are taking so I can join you in Cloud Cuckoo Land.

G A Ware,

Knapton Lane,

York.

...I NEVER cease to be angered and amazed at the sheer arrogance with which Anthony Blair treats the population of this country.

He disregards every opinion of the electorate, while blithely doing exactly as he wants by fair means or foul.

We are the only country in the European Union denied our right to the referendum on the Euro.

Tony Blair decided we should go to war with Iraq, despite the fact that many people were against it. He has steam-rollered the university top-up fees through Parliament with the help of Scottish MPs, whom it will not affect while prevaricating for years on the Hunting Bill.

He ignores the perils of allowing thousands of extra people into this small island of ours, while our own services (doctors, dentists etc) are stretched to the limit treating its own inhabitants.

Now he has decided, apparently, that we will have GM crop trials, regardless of the devastation they could cause to the flora and fauna of this country and despite the fact we have already made it quite clear we do not want them.

It appears that, like the Iraqi people under Saddam, the British seem to have no say in anything of importance that affects the future of ourselves and the generation to come.

Mrs C Carter,

Marston Crescent,

Acomb,

York.

Updated: 09:59 Friday, February 27, 2004