YP Letters: Get behind campaign for devolved Yorkshire

HERE is an idea so our local MPs can make amends for scuppering Brexit, ignoring the electorate in general and their Northern voters in particular. Support a cross-party campaign for devolution for Yorkshire.

This might give us a bit more say in our social and economic destiny than at present, not a hard task.

Here are some stats for our local MPs to contemplate over a lunchtime Prosecco in a trendy London wine bar: Yorkshire’s population is 5.3 million (the population of Scotland with its own devolved parliament is 5.3 million). If Yorkshire was an independent country, it would have finished 12th at the 2012 Olympics.

Yorkshire’s economic output is almost seven per cent of the UK’s total economic output. It has an economy bigger than 11 EU nations. We seem to have little in common with London and the South-East, much like Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland.

Perhaps, for a start, we could then spend our taxes on a Northern high-speed rail link instead of on London’s Crossrail and other London-centric vanity projects; develop local jobs and industries fit for Yorkshire folk, leaving London to its “gig” economy with cheap labour; and stem the bleeding of talent and resources into the South-East.