I HAVE followed with interest the debate between former Labour councillor Richard Newman-Thompson and various members and supporters of the Green Party.

I am obliged to declare an interest because I am a Labour Party member but, being as objective as possible, I have to say it is about time someone in the local Labour Party tried to take on the 'Greens'.

This is a particularly difficult letter for me to write because I actually know and like very much several local 'Greens'.

I've imbibed many a convivial pint with Pascal Desmond, for example, and I am well aware that, at the local level, the vast majority of 'Greens' are decent, honest people.

This, however, does not alter the fact that their political philosophy is both cranky and dangerous.

Their appeal to the electorate is based on an assumption that they are not really interested in the hurly-burly of politics but only in creating a beautiful rural idyll for us all to live in. Politicians being, at the moment, regarded with contempt by about 70 per cent of the population, this public perception gives them a head start in any election. The truth, however, is very different. The 'Greens; have been totally wrong in their predictions over the years. In the 1970s, when they called themselves, 'The Ecology Party' they trumpeted the 'fact' that we had only 30 years of oil supplies left and, if we did not change our lifestyles, armageddon would surely strike with trains, buses and cars grinding to a halt and industry ceasing to function, mass starvation would follow as our whole way of life collapsed at just about the time of the new millennium.

We must act 'now', we were told then, to save our children from this nightmare disaster. Of course, it didn't happen.

Neither did, 'the coming new Ice Age,' that 'Greens' also predicted, aided and abetted by a sensationalist media, in the 1970s.

Who remembers that one in these days of 'global warming?' No wonder they found it necessary to change their name.

The 'Greens' are in the proud tradition of a widely publicised crank in the 19th century, who received a large degree of public support when he predicted that, by 1900, unless the number of hansom cabs in London was greatly reduced, that city would be buried beneath 10 feet of horse manure! We have even earlier examples of prototype 'Green' lunacy. The 'Diggers' of the 17th century who set about demolishing areas of London to grow their cabbages (or perhaps lentils). The normally bloodthirsty Cromwell didn't bother them over-much. He knew that they would solve the problem for him by starving themselves into submission, which they duly did. Of course, the public don't care much about all this. A 'Green' vote at local level cannot do much harm, they reason.

Even if we do get totally contradictory policies like deliberately created traffic jams to pour carbon monoxide into the atmosphere at vastly increased rates in order to 'help the environment', it still gives them a chance to kick the 'establishment politicians' in the teeth. Be careful, though, Mr and Mrs Joe Public. Replace the present 'establishment politicians' with a new, 'Green; political establishment and you will surely live to bitterly regret it. When they next ask for your vote, ask them about their policies on population control.

Or, better still, read them for yourselves on the net. It will frighten you to death!

'The road to hell is paved with good intentions.'

Ray Hill Lancaster