I feel so sorry for the young working person of today.

What with zero hours, health and safety gone mad, needing an expensive all-incurring debt to ‘hopefully’ get a basic job and being in a most controlling position of ‘If you don’t like it – there’s the door!’ My young working life was in the sixties.

Yes there were very strong unions about, but that only counted if you were in an industry that could hold the country to ransom. Outside of that, there was no protection.

Many times when subscribed, they mainly supported the union itself and not the worker.

Back in the sixties, one could ‘jack-in’ a job in the morning and be re-hired again that same afternoon.

That was when they were ‘needing us’ and not ‘feeding us’. Benefits were not a real option with ‘means control’.

You’d have to sell your car, TV, jewellery etc, before even being considered.

We also never had any problems of migrants back then just arriving to claim benefits. Incoming foreigners came and worked very hard.

Now fully retired, I am so grateful that I had my young working days within the sixties and seventies.

Again, I feel so sorry for young folk today and I do believe that things will become even worse, perhaps even enough to drive us all back to the Victorian days!

Christine Peters, Bournemouth