SIR – DS Boyes is only telling half the story when it comes to the so-called “Winter of Discontent” (Letters, July 15). This came about because the Labour government applied a prices and incomes policy that left wages lagging behind prices.
Workers wanted to restore their spending power and clashed with the Labour administration. Hardly an example of irresponsibility on behalf of the Government. Denis Healey did get a short-term loan from the IMF and paid it back very quickly as the economy improved.
Scroll forward to today and again we have a situation where wages lag well behind inflation, far worse than in the 1970s.
The unions want the same now as then, a return to a reasonable standard of living. This situation has come about in a free-market economy; with no attempt to control prices or wages, except for public servants.
The only difference nowadays is that the government borrows hundreds of billions of pounds on the money markets instead of going to the IMF. We were never in Greek-style meltdown, that was a lie in 2010 and remains a lie to this day. Capitalism is the problem, DS Boyes, not the Labour Party.
Ian Parsons, Alexandra Road, Eccleshill, Bradford
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