Sir, – It is difficult to follow Derek Reid's grounds for describing the UK's election as a "resounding victory for the silent majority under David Cameron" (May 12th). Britain's Conservatives are neither silent nor a majority. Cameron got 36.9 per cent of the popular vote, just over a third of votes cast, a long way from a majority. In what sense can the Conservatives be considered "silent"? They have almost complete control of the print media, Sky News is owned by Rupert Murdoch and the BBC is scrupulously neutral.
The Tory vote was up 0.8 per cent and the Labour vote was up 1.4 per cent. What is resounding about that?
The elephant is the room is the Ukip vote, up from 3 per cent to 14 per cent . This was the real story of the election. Was I the only one perplexed by the TV coverage opening with a projection of seats rather than percentages of votes cast, as is normal in electoral results programmes? Was this, one wonders, so that the talking heads could ignore the Ukip showing by discussing seats only? On the evidence of TV coverage of this election, the “Ukippers” may be justified in feeling themselves the silenced minority. – Yours, etc,
TIM O’HALLORAN,
Dublin 11.
Sir, – Barry Walsh (May 13th) appears to confuse "legitimacy" with "fairness". No one, as far as I am aware, has questioned the legitimacy of the UK government which has just been formed. What is in question, and these same questions were raised after the 2005 election, is the over-representation of the Conservative and Labour parties, and now the SNP too, in seats relative to their share of the vote, and the consequent under-representation of the other parties.
It is not just “left-leaning commentators” who have pointed this out; Nigel Farage has criticised a system which has produced just one seat for his party despite around four million people having voted for it.
The referendum in 2011 was about one just one type of PR, the alternative vote system. It was rushed through as part of the coalition agreement, with no proper debate and with the Conservative Party and most of the press opposing it, and the Labour Party lukewarm, and the turnout was 42 per cent of the electorate. The campaign was described by one commentator as “bad tempered and ill informed”. The difficulties of having a proper debate about the voting system, when it suits the two largest parties to keep it as it is, are obvious. – Yours, etc,
BILL REDMOND,
Edinburgh.
Sir, – Is it not time for the people of England to decide, in a separate “in/out” referendum, whether they wish to continue with the union with (a) Scotland, (b)Wales, (c)Northern Ireland – using three separate ballot papers? The ensuing debate and outcome would be guaranteed, at minimum, to fill many more column inches in your respected newspaper. – Yours, etc,
MICK O’BRIEN,
Kilkenny.