IN his usual party political polemics Ribble Valley Tory MP Nigel Evans asks social security minister Oliver Heald to confirm that government policies would protect the incomes, through the basic state pension. Of that one third of pensioners who have no supplementary income (LET, November 14).

The others, he says, have occupational pensions; they are not his concern. The minister's set-piece double-act reply is, "The rise in state pensions during the whole period of the Labour Government was equivalent to the rise in average incomes for pensioners that this government has produced every year since 1979." He offers no proof for this classic New-Tory Speak which outrageously claims credit for the savings some have been able to make. We are being brainwashed for another mugging just as soon as the right pretext is found - the lie about the 'grey time bomb' is part of this agenda.

A few fat cats like Cedric Brown of British Gas make up the government's mythical 'average pensioner.' In fact, of 10 million pensioners, four million now need means-tested support. they are poor because of the Tories' stopping pensions rising with earnings.

G E RAYNER, Whinney Lane, Langho.

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