IT has been four months since I wrote to this page asking John Blunt (LET, February 2) to comment on the current state of the agricultural industry in this country.

Now, while he may not have bought any cotton goods, coal or shoes in that time, I'm fairly certain that he has eaten. Do you get my drift here John? Food is necessary for life itself.

If you feel the need to gripe and whinge about subsidies (of which British livestock farmers get very low levels) then please consider a few relevant facts:

As a percentage of the average wage, the British public spends less on food than the citizens of any other country with the exception of the US. Russians spend a whopping 70 per cent of their average wages on food products (and queue for the privilege).

Thirty per cent of the inhabitants of this planet are officially starving.

Still there, John? I hope so because after you have digested those facts, I'd like to move on and explain to your readers exactly what is the difference between a subsidy, a grant and a benefit.

Apart from the spelling, all these are state-funded handouts which are in place to help and protect sections of society and/or industry. Indeed the dictionary definition of a subsidy is "a sum of money granted by the state or a public body in order to keep down the price of commodities."

So what's your objection to that, John? Presumably, your perfect state would be to do away with all government handouts, including grants to industry, to education, to the unemployed, to the health service, old age pensions, armed forced etc, while at the same time seeing food prices in the shops rise to unaffordable levels.

On the subject of shops and supermarkets, maybe your vitriol would be better targeted at them. Local farmers are currently being paid approximately 8p per pint for milk, 30p for a dozen eggs, 26p per pound for pork pigs, 43p a pound for beef cattle and less than 2.5p a pound for potatoes.

How little do you expect food to cost? Maybe you want it giving?

On a lighter note, a somewhat sobering comparison is that the Lancashire Evening Telegraph, on the day of John Blunt's article on farming, actually worked out at an equivalent price of £1.08 per pound.

Why do you suggest that British farmers ask their counterparts in the shoe, textile and mining sectors what life is like in the real world? All sectors of production and manufacturing know how difficult life under New Labour has become.

Maybe instead of blowing on your tea and contemplating your navel, you should be asking why the economic policies of a Labour government are geared to benefit only a privileged Square Mile in the City of London, while the rest of the country is being slowly sacrificed on the altar of a ridiculously strong pound.

L BANK (Mr), Pleasington, Blackburn.

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