Labour off-colour

John McTernan seems to think that Labour is a socialist party (Perspective, 2 May). Surely in left-speak it is a bourgeois reformist party – and a pretty peely-wally one at that.

Socialists have been waiting for some 150 years for the crisis of capitalism which will, they believe, usher in the dictatorship of the proletariat. When something like that crisis occurred a year or two ago what did the Labour government of the day do? It bailed out the bankers!

By the way, why couldn’t a Labour government in an independent Scotland do the things Mr McTernan lists?

S Beck

Craigleith Drive

Edinburgh