I FEEL I must respond to John Cumberland’s attack on me (HAS, Apr 1).

Of course, John is not critical of Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s incredibly uncaring payments to the self-employed. John states he has been self-employed all his life therefore, and importantly, he has a tax return for 2019!

Sadly, my youngest newly self-employed son does not, so he is left high and dry by the Tories, despite having bills to pay.

Mr Sunak then rubs salt into the wounds by inferring that newly self-employed cannot claim because they may “commit fraud”, thereby tarring them all with the same brush.

My son, for the record, has a PAYE P60 from April 2019, a documented P45 and a payslip for every self-employed working week since the date of his P45.

At a time that John’s Conservative Party leader Boris states that there is a thing called “society”, the Conservatives have proven that this is not the case.

My wife and my eldest son’s girlfriend are both nurses in the NHS and their current positions put them at the vanguard of the fight against Covid-19.

If John falls ill, and I sincerely hope he does not, then he will no doubt meet them both at the local hospital.

However, John’s beloved Conservative Party does not buy into the “society” concept. If it did, it would look after the few hundred thousand newly self-employed who do not have a 2019 tax return.

It would also ease the concerns of family members such as myself who worry that our courageous NHS partners are being let down by the Tories through a lack of providing adequate personal protective equipment, as is being widely reported by both the Echo and BBC.

I am also key worker in the educational support worker environment so I have done my bit for “society” as well. I spent two days delivering food vouchers to the less advantaged students.

Our house has a long history of voting Conservative. However, that party is now a very dirty word in our house and it is now extremely unlikely the Conservatives’ Ben Houchen will secure our mayoral election votes next year.

Yes, we are very bitter towards the Conservative Party.

Mark Anderson, Middleton St. George.