I THOUGHT the dinosaur was extinct until I read Bill Potts' letter (September 22 - 'Blair can't ignore peasants revolt').

I THOUGHT the dinosaur was extinct until I read Bill Potts' letter (September 22 - 'Blair can't ignore peasants revolt'). If he had his way we would still be burning witches at the stake.

I have to say to him it wasn't Tony Blair or Alistair Campbell who suffered a bloody nose, but the thousands of people who had their lives disrupted by the actions of the farmers and lorry drivers.

Years ago in the Thatcher era, when it was the miners, the steel workers the car workers, the print workers at Wapping and the rest of the trade union people who were demonstrating because their jobs were on the line I have no doubt that Bill Potts was singing a different song, and cheering Maggie on.

Maggie Thatcher made it quite clear that she was going to stop groups of people from causing disruption and holding a gun to the government's head. Remember how she made strikes illegal unless they conformed to a strict set of rules, and secondary picketing was totally illegal, full stop. It's the sickening hypocrisy of people such as Bill Potts that really gets me.

I can remember Maggie saying at the time of the poll tax demonstrations, people had no right to make demonstrations of that nature. If you disagreed with government policy, the ballot box was the weapon to use. What has happened to all those arguments?

We have a democracy in this county and it works through the ballot box, and when you vote people in, it's because you then entrust them to make decisions on your behalf, because they, in most cases, have more facts at their disposal than you have. To try and suggest that the government have to alter policies on a weekly basis to suit the noisiest protesters is downright ludicrous. No government worth its salt would do that.

On the fuel issue, this government have virtually the identical policies that the Tories had. Many governments meeting at Kyoti agreed that fuel taxes would be increased as a counter to pollution. For Michael Portillo to suggest, as he has, that that purpose has been achieved is absolutely ludicrous. Everyone must realise that the fight against environmental pollution is an ongoing one.

The Government knows full well that if they give in to the demands of the demonstrators, that next week there will be another group trying the same tactics. The same arguments as when you don't give in to blackmailers and hi-jackers.

It would take pages to go into and answer the other issues raised by the grossly bigoted rubbish that Bill Potts writes in his letter.

N S Benyon

Hughenden Avenue

High Wycombe