CHRIS FOOTE WOOD’S letter in support of Labour candidate Helen Goodman in the Bishop Auckland constituency carefully avoids the elephant in the room, namely Labour’s abysmal national leadership and policies, not least over Brexit.

All the other political parties – Conservative, Lib Dem and the Brexit Party – have clear policies on Brexit that will actually take us forward from here, one way or the other.

By contrast, Labour’s Brexit policy is muddled and confusing.

As far as one can gather it is ‘we’ll stage a re-run of the national debate and EU negotiations that have caused such bad feeling, confusion and parliamentary paralysis since 2016 – and then, in a few years, we might leave the EU – or maybe not’.

On this ground alone, Mr Foote Wood should be swallowing his pride and voting either LibDem (if he’s a remain voter) or (given his evident antipathy to the Conservatives) for the Brexit Party if he wants to leave the EU.

Brian Abbott, Bishop Auckland