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Letter: Blair and Lib Dems

Derek J. Cole
Wednesday 31 December 1997 00:02 GMT
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Sir: We Lib Dems would never join Tony Blair in any alliance of the centre-left. The single- parent benefit incident proves that Tony Blair is the natural leader of the centre-right. If the Conservatives split, Ken Clarke and Michael Heseltine could easily join him. By background, upbringing, instinct and manner, Blair is a Tory grandee.

It is a farce for him to say he admires Keynes, Beveridge and Lloyd George; he is attacking all they ever stood for - and I speak as a Liberal who still has the obituary press cuttings I took when Lloyd George died. That radical Liberal trio would fully endorse the protest from the Labour MEPs Ken Coates and Hugh Kerr against government policy on the welfare state.

The idea that we Lib Dems would sustain Tony Blair against Ken Livingstone and his friends has always been political theory run mad.

DEREK J COLE

St Leonards, East Suss

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