SIR – Ian Parsons, (‘Banks started crisis’, Letters, January 17), says that if I understood The Guardian and Observer, I would be repeating the saying “the global banking system caused the economic crisis”.

Thank you, Mr Parsons. He forgets that The Guardian and Observer are newspapers, not bibles and are not necessarily to be quoted unconditionally. Yes, the banks created the mess, I do not deny.

Once more for the record: Labour’s lack of regulation of one of the world’s largest financial centres, a) contributed to the economic collapse, and, b) ensured that we were more adversely affected than many other countries. Indeed we are still paying the price.

That price is the cost of living crisis made worse by Labour’s lack of housebuilding and positive encouragement of house price inflation. Housing costs rise faster than RPI on which benefits and wage increases are based, leaving families with less disposable income: Labour’s cost of living crisis!

John Hall, Pennithorne Avenue, Baildon