SIR - I hope, for the sake of his party, that George Roe will treat the approaches of unions like the Communication Workers' Union with great caution (Oxford Mail, March 26).

It would hardly fit his rightly held position over democratic opposition to the Iraq war to have on his membership list people who engage in profoundly undemocratic 'wildcat' strikes.

The tragedy of trade unions is that they care little about the people they allegedly represent - not when there is a democratically-elected Government they can bring down.

Throughout the 1970s, strikes were held solely for this reason.

Ordinary people, who simply wanted to earn a crust, were forced out of work for various petty excuses, simply because it would topple the Government.

According to the Department of Employment during the 1970s, some 25,924 strikes were called (roughly 500 a week), costing millions in lost time and doing little for the manufacturing industry.

The greater tragedy now, of course, is that working people no longer have a trustworthy voice through which to voice legitimate concerns.

Union executives (like all executives, extraordinarily well-off compared with their membership) have their own agendas and anything that doesn't fit within that is simply ignored.

I wonder whether they will even bother to ballot their membership over this change of allegiance. Sadly, I very much doubt it. Three cheers for democracy.

ALAN PAGE

Iffley Road

Oxford