LIKE Francis Ray (letters, July 5), I was an idealist in my youth, but my generation’s dreams were dashed by grey figures in positions of power.

Now, as my seventies rush towards me, I have a confession to make: I’m still an idealist.

Society has mostly been run by those with wealth, power and privilege, who succeed in conning a significant proportion of the population into believing that it’s somehow in their interest to ensure those people maintain their wealth, power and privilege.

It’s time that changed.

Mr Ray harks back to the Labour government of 1997-2010, somehow blaming it for the great financial crash while conveniently forgetting the 2005 Tory election pledge to match Labour on public spending.

The net result of the financial crisis - caused by the blind greed of speculators - was that the government was forced to bail out private institutions with £800 billion of public money.

Instead of being jailed, the perpetrators of this outrage were rewarded with honours, bonuses and vast golden handshakes.

Many insist on comparing the national economy to a household one, but it’s a tad more complicated than that.

The country still has a lot of wriggle-room economically, as shown by the shameful deal with the DUP – in spite of our GDP sinking to 0.2 per cent, and national and personal debt at crisis levels.

It’s a question of priorities.

The open letter from 100 of the world’s leading economists (strangely unreported by some national newspapers) fully endorsed the strategy set out in the Labour manifesto.

The oft repeated mantra of the Tories as the party of economic competence is a myth of Orwellian proportions.

Yes, I’m with the young in wanting to see a fairer society and an end to the Tories’ brutal and unnecessary austerity.

We can be both idealistic and realistic.

Paul Halas

Stroud