CONTRARY to the letter written by Ken Kemp that I had swallowed the Tory/Lib Dem line on the 2008 recession ‘hook, line and sinker’ ( HAS, Nov 7) he is very wrong.

In fact, was it not a Labour cabinet minister who left a letter after the last General Election saying that the country had no money left because they had spent it?

Had Ed Balls, Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband, who were all in the treasury at various times during the New Labour years, kept an eye on the ball, and not started spending taxpayers’ money as if it was their own, then we may not have suffered the recession we are still trying to get out of.

I also note that Mr Kemp missed the main point of my letter, namely that a bunch of Ed Miliband’s close ‘friends’ were out to get him removed as leader of the Labour party, saying one thing in public and plotting behind his back to have him removed.

Low and behold we now read ( Echo, Nov 7) that Ed Miliband has had to go public saying that the plot is rubbish and dismissing rumours of a bid to oust him as Labour leader.

I do hope the content of my previous letter did not give them the courage to make a move.

John Merry, Darlington