NICK CLEGG has made a deal with the Tories that puts the interests of his Party and the ambitions of his MPs ahead of the principles he stood for in the General Election.

He has backed a hard-line Tory agenda, gambling with economic recovery and making the poorest pay the most towards the deficit.

People voted Liberal Democrat on the basis that they were progressive and represented a new kind of politics. Nick Clegg has betrayed our trust, signing off a big increase in VAT and cuts to child tax credit that will hit ordinary families hard, especially pensioners, who will get no extra tax allowance to compensate them for paying more in VAT.

Rather like Ramsay MacDonald in the Thirties, Nick Clegg has sacrificed his principles not just as a price for power, but to satisfy his own ego.

He cannot be trusted again and at the next General Election he, and his Party, will suffer the consequences of their actions.

Giles Harris, Hardwick.

FROM 1979 until 2010 we have has only two governments in power – the Conservatives and Labour.

In all that time these two parties have really messed up this country’s finances. It is no good one blaming the other – they are both incompetent.

As for Nick Clegg, he is a traitor to the people who voted for the Liberal Democrats and should be made to stand down as leader and defect to the Conservatives.

J M Gowland, Heighington.