I AGREE with the sentiments expressed by Dr Graham Turner about the UK arms trade (September 10), and to answer the question he raises, the Labour Party is not a socialist party.

It is too busy pandering to the likes of Digby Jones of the CBI and big business to be bothered about achieving an equal society.

This was confirmed by speeches by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown at the TUC conference.

The fact that the Government supported the arms fair was an outrage. Among the shoppers invited to the arms fair were Israel, which uses weapons to continue its oppression of the Palestinian people, and Columbia, whose armed forces have been linked to paramilitaries responsible for the deaths of more than 180 trade unionists last year.

Andrew Collingwood,

Turners Croft,

Heslington, York.

Updated: 11:47 Tuesday, September 16, 2003