MADAM – "There is no money left".

"Something had to be done to bring this madman's merry-go-round of inflation to a stop".

Two memorable and portentous statements by government ministers, Labour ministers; the first by a man in Mr Brown's cabinet on leaving office in 2010, it is the most crisp definition of bankruptcy imaginable.

Depending upon court orders, bankruptcy can ban a man or company from dealing for six years, yet here we are contemplating letting Labour have their fingers in our money bags again.

The electorate is the ultimate jury.

The second was by Mr Wilson's Chancellor, Mr Healey on July 11, 1975, following the rate of inflation rising to 26 per cent which led Wilson's administration to pass a law legally limiting pay rises.

Infighting in his cabinet resulted in Wilson resigning his premiership in 1976.

Following a distinguished war record, Mr Attlee won the 1945 election for Labour; and experienced continual cabinet quarrelling.

He succeeded in gaining a second term in office, and a contemporary report (April 1951) said his cabinet meeting(s) were stormy; to the extent that to carry on proved an impossibility. He resigned his administration in October 1951.

Aneurin Bevan, who devised the NHS, minister of labour and 'stormy petrel' of the socialist left 'resigned in fury'.

At general elections there is usually the question: man or party?

In 1997, election year: John Major was the Tory prime minister; an examination of the GDP records show that for the four years prior to 1997 the UK GDP had been growing at five per cent year on year; an excellent financial situation.

Ten years later we had had a devastating war in Iraq devised by two conniving leaders based on a dodgy dossier.

It has caused political, religious and financial upheaval ever since.

Also at the end of that ten years the government lost control of the banking industry, resulting in the bankruptcy of 2010 and untold debt, from which we are suffering now.

Bankruptcy implies a triple whammy, first you have to repair confidence in industry and get it producing, you have no money so you have to demonstrate goodwill and borrow, you have to repay your debts.

This involves a long period of belt tightening.

This Our Chancellor has achieved.

He has shown great efficiency and success, now the choice is yours: chuck it all away and call back the lot who caused the bankruptcy, or keep going?

N O Taylor

Nailsworth