I WAS recently in Albania, helping to train Albanian politicians. In Albania, when a party loses an election, it frequently criticises its opponents for winning rather than addressing its own failings.

Western agencies, and many Albanians, expect this situation to improve over time.

It therefore comes as something of a surprise to me to discover that in Britain, a mature democracy, the Conservative Party seems to be taking a leaf out of the Albanians' book. Faced with a potential defeat, the Conservatives declare that a Labour victory is a danger to democracy, rather than an expression of the electorate's will.

This is all the more odd given that the Conservatives were themselves recently in power for 18 years, for much of that time with an impressive majority.

The Labour leadership of the time never resorted to such absurd scare tactics as those now employed by Mr Hague, and the minority on the left who saw Margaret Thatcher's premiership as tantamount to a dictatorship were proved utterly wrong when she resigned in a dignified manner, recognising that the people and her party had turned against her.

One is forced to ask oneself which is the more committed to democracy the party that leads in the opinion polls or the party that calls "foul" before the result is even known.

Malcolm Barres-Baker

Treasurer

Beaconsfield Constituency

Labour Party