I CANNOT accept Gladys Robinson's view that "each and every one of us is to blame for the state of the nation (Letters, September 20).

All that the common man or woman can do is vote every five years for a party which promises to come nearest to what he or she wants it to do, although we know that successive governments all betray us by reneging on their manifesto pledges and feathering their own nests once they gain power.

You can try expressing your anger by writing to your MP or government ministers. In most cases their parliamentary private secretaries will send a bland pre-prepared reply.

You can write to the Lancashire Evening Telegraph, but only a handful of people choose to do this, and your letter will either be largely ignored or else rebutted by another correspondent with a legitimately opposite viewpoint or a different axe to grind.

Words like "head", "banging" and "brick wall" come to mind.

Most of us want to enjoy the basic human right to live safe, uncomplicated lives; we want to see our taxes spent fairly and without fraud; we want the police to apply zero tolerance to thieves, burglars, vandals, muggers and violent criminals; we want the law to favour those of us who abide by it rather than those who choose to flout it; most of us (though not all) want our country to be run by our elected representatives rather than by faceless, distant and often dishonest Eurocrats.

Pardon my cynicism, but hell will freeze over before you or I will be able to change a single damn thing about it.

KEITH ELLEL, Westwood Avenue, Rishton.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.