Hearallsides.

(From The Northern Echo)

TONY BLAIR ACCORDING to your editorial (Echo, Sept 27) "Tony Blair made the Labour Party electable". In reality, the Conservative Party was so unpopular at the time of the 1997 General Election that a tramp from the street could have led Labour to victory. Let us examine a few facts. Labour may well have won the 1992 election had it not been for the then leader, Neil Kinnock, behaving like a football hooligan at a Sheffield election rally. The buffoonish Kinnock was then replaced by the extremely popular and affable John Smith, who took over at a time when sterling collapsed. Labour then took an unassailable 20-point lead in the opinion polls. Under Smith's leadership this lead was maintained until his tragic death two years later. Blair rode on the back of this wave to an election victory in 1997. Labour then enjoyed another substantial victory in 2001, but lost millions of votes. In 2005, the number of Labour votes cast fell to its second lowest since the Second World War. Membership has halved, there have been allegations of corruption, blood has been spilled all over the world, there is a GBP27m party overdraft, and party organisation barely exists in many parts of the country. Some legacy. John Gilmore, Bishop Auckland. WELL done, Peter Mullen (Echo, Sept 26). His version of the PM's farewell speech to the Labour Party conference was a lot nearer the truth than the real thing. He forgot to mention the Chancellor robbing the pension funds. Mick Kilvington, Richmond, North Yorkshire. TALKING CCTV UNDENIABLY, the litterer is an anti-social yob who deserves his town's droppings to be deposited in his lounge with a request to express his views on how he likes it - then again, he might consider it an improvement of his surroundings. As an ex-law enforcement officer, Ray Mallon (Echo, Sept 22) might be expected to sit in praise of his town's talking CCTV initiative. Especially now that a system exists which can respectfully request a drunk to stop kicking someone's head in, or for a burglar to consider climbing back out of a window while awaiting arrest. Wrong use, you proclaim; this is about littering. How many readers shared my instinctive thoughts when becoming aware of Middlesbrough's "innovative" vision? As an old-timer I have seen many once-considered weird ideas eventually come to fruition and to anyone who is familiar with Patrick McGoohan's TV series, The Prisoner, I highly recommend the experience as the forerunner of another. Is there any point at which society questions the limits of spying on its perceived freedoms and to the sacrifices it is prepared to make in the name of the politics of law and order, rather than the route of education and leadership? Just when does nanny become a child abuser? C Simons, Bishop Auckland. RURAL AMBULANCES WE write to thank all councillors and residents of Weardale and Teesdale who attended the public consultation meetings and who wrote to the Durham Dales Primary Care Trust (PCT), MPs Hilary Armstrong and Helen Goodman, Secretary of State for Health and the Rural Advocate in support of a better deal for our rural ambulance service. The PCT has listened to the arguments put at the meetings and has agreed to the A&E ambulance with a paramedic and technician (not the emergency care assistant) being retained within both dales. It has also agreed to keep open the stations at St John's ...