Jonathan Sheppard's words about the Tories giving people "a hand up, not a hand out" (Letters, April 16) will rankle with those who spent 18 years on and off the dole while their communities disintegrated around them.

Since coming to power, Labour has helped millions of people back into work and is helping people regenerate their own communities, as we have seen so successfully in east Brighton through the New Deal.

Charges of sleaze should not be tossed around by a member of a party that, until recently, included convicted criminals Jeffrey Archer and Jonathan Aitken.

Speaking up for those who want to chase animals round the countryside and tear them apart is not a good way to win votes. Hunting will be banned by the Government because that is what the people want.

To say the Conservatives are a party inclusive of people regardless of sexuality, race or religion will also sound hollow to anyone who read Shadow Cabinet member Eric Forth's comments that the Tories need to represent the "millions of white, Anglo-Saxon, bigoted people in this country" and that "sucking up to minorities" was "ridiculous".

Tory leader Ian Duncan Smith was tabling parliamentary questions about repatriating immigrants just seven years ago. He is on record as being pro-hanging and caning. The Tories have changed, yes, but only by moving further and further to the right.

Shadow Health Secretary Liam Fox now talks openly about cutting state funding for the NHS and making us all pay private health insurance. Are these really the kind of politicians we want running our own local public services in 12 months' time?

The local Tories are keen to jump on any bandwagon that's passing in order to shore up their ageing and dwindling support.

The one exception, of course, is on the issue of a new home for the Albion, where they are keeping very quiet so as not to lose votes in Woodingdean and Rottingdean.

-Warren Morgan, Freshfield Street, Brighton