SIR – Rod Emmerson (T&A Letters, November 18) was happily recycling Tory myths about the causes of the recession, seemingly unaware that the Prime Minister’s special economic adviser Lord Young was telling a somewhat different story to a national newspaper.

“Recession? What recession?” asked his lordship, adding that most people had never had it so good and, to the embarrassment of David Cameron and George Osborne, revealing that the depth of the recession has been exaggerated to ‘save the pound’.

Lord Young should know all about saving the pound because, as a member of the Thatcher government blindly following the remedies of Friedman and Hayek, he would have seen our exchange rate rise to $2.40 to the pound.

The consequence – as those who worked in the Yorkshire wool textile industry will remember – was its near total destruction as its exports became uncompetitive and its machinery sold to foreign competitors.

Mr Emmerson wants a resurgence of manufacturing, but this will never happen if the real objective of our Chancellor’s misinformation about the state of the economy is ever achieved.

That is to say a manageable recession becomes another Tory contrived calamity on the back of an overvalued currency.

Brian Holmans, Langley Road, Bingley