I am writing to register my deep dismay and outrage that the Conservative party’s official response to Jeremy Corbyn’s victory in the Labour party leadership election, as reflected in David Cameron’s tweet, is to state that Labour “is now a threat to our national security, our economic security and your family’s security”. For the leader of a democratic country to put the democratically elected leader of the main political opposition party in the same category as Isis is defamatory, intentionally misleading and a deeply undemocratic thing to do. I hope that he is challenged both legally by the people he has defamed and publicly by other citizens. The “chilling effect” statements such as these made by those in power have on freedom of association and freedom of speech are well documented around the world, and are rightly condemned. I may not be a member of the Labour party or have taken part in the recent election, but as a British citizen I would strongly defend the right of those concerned to exercise political choice. Cameron’s response is a profound attack on the UK’s democratic traditions, and should be condemned in the strongest possible terms.
Ursula Lindenberg
Frome, Somerset
• I see the Tories and their cronies in the rightwing press have wasted no time in unveiling their five-year anti-Corbyn propaganda crusade – he’s a threat to national, economic, and family security, etc – in the belief that if people hear something often enough, they’ll believe it. But could it be that they’re running scared? They must know that – with a shaky economic recovery and five more years of biting cuts, rising house and rent prices, ideologically driven policies and corporate deregulations that will affect people from all walks of life – come the next election the electorate might very well have turned leftwards enough to embrace the policies that Corbyn offers. All the pundits now declaring that Labour is dead because of Corbyn completely misread the post-election mood and never even saw him coming, so what do they know?
Bruce Paley
Castle Morris, Pembrokeshire
More letters on the future of Labour under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership:
