SIR – Nigel Farage is quite right in suggesting on his visit to our historic Guildhall that the young have been wrongly labelled as lazy and useless (Worcester News, April 4).

It is a betrayal of potential and of the young themselves that we face a lost generation of talent and achievement.

There is a contagious negativity afflicting our doomladen nation at this time.

Our politicians have barely anything positive to say.

Young people are lazy, people on welfare are lazy, public services are inefficient, the list is endless.

What is needed is inspirational positive language and investment in productive ideas.

People looking to what they individually and collectively can achieve and how they can inspire others rather than resentfully assessing the conduct of others against their own beliefs and prejudices.

Our politicians may think it’s expedient to gain support on the basis of nourishing resentments but at a tremendous cost to the emotional and social health of the population at a time when the bleak economic circumstances are worrying enough even for relatively comfortable people.

Just as in war-time, morale needs to be preserved in the longest downturn in living memory.

How are people to make the best of themselves in an unrelenting climate of negativity and how as a trading nation are we to do better in the world marketplace if our news agenda proves us to be a divided nation too frightened to invest (or even believe) in our own future.

ANDREW BROWN

Worcester