There is an omission in Jonathan Aldred’s account of how western capitalism began to shortchange many people from 1980 onwards (The long read, 6 June). For decades after 1945, communist tanks lined the borders of western Europe and communist parties were strong in Italy and France. The western system strove to retain popular loyalty by successfully providing the masses with better lifestyles than could communism – through the NHS, welfare benefits and reasonable wages. This was maintained at least in part by the heavy taxes on the super-rich, whose post-1980 reduction Jonathan Aldred describes.
From 1980, Reagan and Thatcher launched a climate of credible military confrontation with Soviet communism, leading to the demise of the latter – and hence no need to moderate capitalism in order to compete with a rival system. The gloves are off, the super-rich are getting ever richer, and step by step the benign features of 1945-79 UK capitalism are being dismantled.
Charles Patmore
York
Jonathan Freedland’s “How Brexit caused the strange death of British conservatism” (8 June) is an extraordinary headline because the conservatism of Edmund Burke and Michael Oakeshott died long ago during Thatcher’s time under the influence of the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Chicago school economists, when Farage was himself a Tory. So now, while the Brexit party may “rail against” a hated elite, their unexplained substantial funding implies reliance on an elite’s money, possibly even the same elite that funds the Tory party. And while its philosophy may be “slash and burn”, the Tory cabinet’s (many now standing for leader) cuts to health, social care, including care for disabled people, and education make them the destroyers. With such alternatives, voting Labour is the best option.
David Murray
Wallington, Surrey
Jonathan Freedland suggests that the current Conservative party is anything but. The Conservative party lost its conservative nature in May 1979. For all the championing of Victorian values, Margaret Thatcher was a radical. Subsequently, any Conservative politician with ambitions has been required to worship at the altar of the blessed Margaret, and to fight others on the field of who can out-Thatcher the other. In the current Conservative and Unionist party (for how much longer?) she would be dismissed for being far too leftwing.
Nick Pattinson
Stockport, Greater Manchester
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