SIR – John Shearon is the one who hasn’t a clue about the economy (December 1) – all he has is seemingly blind faith in the Labour party and Gordon Brown, who he has written in defence of several times over the past couple of months.

It’s about time he woke up, took off the blinkers, and realised that Gordon Brown got us into this terrible economic mess (not the USA, as everyone now understands) by creating a massive expansion of government borrowing, and jobs in the civil service (more than one million ) over the past 10 years, and at the same time turning a blind eye and failing to take any action to persuade the Financial Services Authority, banks, and the building societies not to be so shortsighted and greedy in their mortgage lending, personal loans and credit cards to millions of people without genuine credentials.

All during this time he was, of course, sneering at any criticism and continually claiming that his policies were leading the country to “sustained growth” every quarter, but as was obvious to many of us years ago it was all completely unsustainable and would collapse like a pack of cards when the financial market eventually realised what a dire situation it had created for itself, as Gordon Brown, the Chancellor and overall financial controller in the UK, should have forseen.

DEREK BADDELEY, Malvern