General Election results show why our electoral system needs reform - Yorkshire Post letters

Do you back electoral reform after the Tories won a 80-seat majority? Photo: Joe Giddens/PA WireDo you back electoral reform after the Tories won a 80-seat majority? Photo: Joe Giddens/PA Wire
Do you back electoral reform after the Tories won a 80-seat majority? Photo: Joe Giddens/PA Wire
From: David Collins, Scissett.

HOPEFULLY we can get Brexit started soon. We then urgently need to have a look at our electoral system.

Labour had a reduction in votes of 7.9 per cent and lost 59 seats.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The biggest beneficiary of this was the Liberal Democrats whose votes increased by 4.2 per cent and they lost one seat.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn casts his vote - was he to blame for his party's election defeat? Photo: Joe Giddens/PA WireLabour leader Jeremy Corbyn casts his vote - was he to blame for his party's election defeat? Photo: Joe Giddens/PA Wire
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn casts his vote - was he to blame for his party's election defeat? Photo: Joe Giddens/PA Wire

Next were the Brexit Party with a two per cent increase and no seats.

Greens increased by 1.1 per cent and no new seats.

Conservatives increased by 1.2 per cent and 47 new seats.

SNP increased their vote by 0.8 per cent and gained 13 seats.

Boris Johnson waves on the steps of 10 Downing Street after his election win. Photo: Victoria Jones/PA WireBoris Johnson waves on the steps of 10 Downing Street after his election win. Photo: Victoria Jones/PA Wire
Boris Johnson waves on the steps of 10 Downing Street after his election win. Photo: Victoria Jones/PA Wire

As this is a national election there is obviously something drastically wrong with our method of allocating seats.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

I think there are too many MPs at 650. We should reduce this by half. One of the biggest failings at present is that too much time and effort is spent on constituency matters that could be transferred to the Citizens Advice Bureau and be more professionally handled. The House of Lords or a second chamber should be reduced to a more manageable 200.

From: Ian Richardson, Railway Street, Beverley.

SUDDENLY everyone on the left is an expert on what went wrong on Thursday. For millions of us it is a doubly devastating defeat, as it heralds not just five years of a brand of Conservatism many of us fear but also comes with the bitter pill of Brexit to swallow over the next five weeks.

To compound the gloom still more, only in Scotland can we see progressive politics on the march and the more the SNP prosper, the more likely they are to leave the rest of the UK to the kind of politics that has given a man like Boris Johnson such immense power.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Of all the lessons to learn from Thursday, and there will be many, one surmounts all others – you can’t succeed with leaders who do not have a broad appeal.

Without credible leadership, the best of policies largely fall on deaf ears.

Jeremy Corbyn and Jo Swinson were both hapless, hopeless at delivering votes.

The first step on the long rocky road back for both parties is to select far more effective successors to challenge what, I must concede, are the considerable political skills of Boris Johnson.

From: Thomas W Jefferson, Batty Lane, Howdwen, Goole.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

IN the aftermath of the general election, the following Shakespearean quotations seem apt.

For the once proud Labour Party, now reduced to a Corbian rump, the slightly adapted words of Antony on seeing the crumpled remains of the assassinated Caesar: “O mighty Labour! dost thou lie so low? Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoils, shrunk to this little measure?”.

For the Lib-Dems, unsurprisingly, a tragedy: Macbeth “I have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, but only vaulting ambition, which o’er-leaps itself and falls on the other”.

For the Conservatives, who now have to convert opportunity into achievement, Brutus, on the eve of battle: “There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads onto fortune; Omitted and all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in misery.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“On such a full sea are we now afloat; And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.”

From: Mr R Turner, Hollybank Avenue, Upper Cumberworth, Bakersfield.

WHAT a fantastic election result. The electorate got its own back.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Hopefully most who lost their seats were the ones who ignored and treated their constituents with utter disregard on the EU referendum result, now they can take their own medicine.

Sorry Yvette Cooper managed to survive, she really needed to go. Now I hope Boris Johnson finishes the job to get us out of the EU, no deal the preferred start, and build from the bottom.

Rebuild and back up Britain’s priorities and stop the derogatory attitudes that have developed from being under the EU domination.

From; M.K. O’Sullivan, Victoria Street, Allerton Bywater, Castleford.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

FOLLOWING the election, the taste of Schadenfreude still lingers pleasantly.

I think of the dismay among those who have tried so hard to nullify the referendum result – Hilary Benn, Barry Sheerman, Richard Burgon, Rachel Reeves, Yvette Cooper, Mary Creagh come to mind.

I think, too, how bitter Friday breakfast will have tasted for the likes of Gina Miller, the arch Remainer, and also for the UK Supreme Court judges.

Far be it for me to advise Liberal Democrats on what to do from here, but unbridled arrogance like we saw from Jo Swinson turns many off.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Am I blind to the faults of Boris Johnson? I am not. Look at Jeremy Corbyn, Swinson and see why voting for him was the only answer.

From: Mark Elliott, Ferrensby, Knaresborough.

THE reasons for the demise of Labour in the electoral “red wall” can be summed up quite simply: the metropolitan elite London leadership of the party spent far too much time worrying about causes such as Palestine whilst completely forgetting about places like Penistone.

News you can trust since 1754
Follow us
©National World Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.Cookie SettingsTerms and ConditionsPrivacy notice