NEW LABOUR: P ROACHE (HAS, Jul 2) is crowing about New Labour basking in the glory of two election victories and also talks about the Miners' Gala.

Let me remind him that before Neil Kinnock was leader of the Labour Party he was a thorn in the side of Michael Foot, the then leader of the Labour Party.

Mr Kinnock was invited to attend the Miners' Gala. It's part of the NUM constitution to invite all leaders of the party to attend the Gala. He decided not to come, that was his choice.

Tony Blair is invited to come to the Miners' Galas. He should come to thank the mining communities of the North-East for the millions of pounds that his Government is taking from the Mineworkers' pension Scheme.

The RMT looks likely to sever its historic links with Labour because of the Government's betrayal and decision to cut its funding. Other unions could follow.

The present Labour Government has failed its promises. We are still short of teachers, education is in a mess, short on doctors, the NHS in a crisis millions of pounds of taxpayers' money wasted. - DT Murray, Coxhoe, Durham.

RETIREMENT AGE

I RETIRED at the age of 60 because I could. I was offered a deal by my employers which enabled me to retire at that age.

I took it because the work I did provided a livelihood but it was not a calling. Retirement was an escape from time at work I did not want to do, and gave me the release to get involved in activities I preferred to spend my hours engaged in.

Since I have retired I have been offered employment but it was to do a job I could have had no enthusiasm for.

I have had choices. But the proposal that a worker does not need to retire until he or she is 70 arises because of two sets of circumstances which place them in an unfortunate position.

One, is that a person needs to work to avoid poverty because the state retirement pension is inadequate and will get worse. The other is because of the mismanagement of a pension fund or the fall in stock market values, pensions people thought they were getting have depreciated in value.

The proposals made by the Government are not to tackle ageism as claimed, but to get them and businesses out of a quandary, because the fourth biggest economy in the world cannot offer people who have retired a decent retirement after a lifetime's work and graft.

Conditions are getting worse rather than better, and people have the right to be far angrier about how they are being treated than they are. - Geoffrey Bulmer, Billingham.

SOCKBURN DRAGON

I WAS interested in Chris Lloyd's article "In Search of the Sockburn dragon" (Echo, July 4).

However, I would disagree with him that the English mythological obsession with dragons refers to an "invader who was spewing foul and treacherous words and laying waste to large tracts of countryside and even raping all the womenfolk".

That's not to say I believe real-life dragons ever existed. No, I think the English hatred of dragons is really a hatred felt, not for an invader, but a native people. Chris seems to have missed the fact that the dragon is the enforced symbol of Wales. Has he forgotten how good the English are at lying?

Consider this, Chris. In warfare, propaganda can be just as powerful as swords and spears! I am willing to bet that rumours were spread about the Brits being fire-breathing dragons. Rumours which spread like wildfire among an illiterate and warlike continental race like the English.

If it was propaganda, it worked. Everyone in southern Scotland and England once spoke a Welsh tongue, but no trace of these people, apart from their place-names such as Avon, Cumbria, Devon etc, remain. What the English did to the native Britons is not known, but one can only guess at "ethnic cleansing" on a Balkanesque scale. - Aled Jones, Bridlington.

SMOKING

IF this country follows the line of the US and Canada by imposing a total ban on smoking in pubs and restaurants, our Government will have a big fight on their hands.

We have enough regulations in place already but at least we still have a choice, not another liberty being taken away.

No one will agree that smoking is healthy but neither is drinking alcohol or being forced to inhale car exhaust fumes on the street.

Having just returned from a Canadian holiday, as a smoker I was irritated by the paranoia existing since a total ban was imposed last year. Bingo halls have closed and private clubs that fought for the right to make their own decisions, lost their battle and business has suffered as a result.

The thought of "smokeless" pubs in the UK does not bear thinking about. The already struggling and fragile licensed trade would not take kindly to a ban as smokers would stay at home.

Are we smokers, already in the minority, going to allow the majority to impose their will on us?

The exaggerated warnings on cigarette packaging are quite obviously composed by puritan non-smokers.

How about warnings on bottles of spirits? Or, car manufacturers being forced to display an etched warning about exhaust fumes on the rear windscreen?

There is risk in everything we do. We all know and understand these risks but taking them should be our choice, not the Government's. - John Chatfield, Frosterley.