WHAT planet does David James think he is living on? (Letters, September 5). I don’t believe we have had that kind of democracy for some time, certainly not in my lifetime.

When you stand for Parliament, irrespective of the party, you are asked to sign that you will take the whip, meaning quite simply you have to vote the way you are told; if you don’t sign you cannot stand.

There are very few free votes in the house; if your constituency will be seriously affected by the vote, the whips may let you vote against or abstain so that you can tell your constituents you’re a man of principle.

But this is only if the government will win the day, otherwise you will have pressure put on you to conform; it could be a job within government or more likely the whip will be taken away from you.

If you lose the whip it means you’re then an independent Member of Parliament with no assistance from your party. It usually means you have to fight the next election as an independent and very few independent candidates get elected.

If David James thinks this is democracy then I feel sorry for him; the days of great debate went out a long time ago.

Does he not realise that the Prime Minister has more power than the President of the United States? He can take us to war without asking parliament. The executive have most of the power, parliament has committees that can look at things after the event. If that’s what you believe to be democracy so be it. I do not.

If anyone is really interested in democracy, and I do not think there are many, ballot papers should have a box stating “None of the above”. In that way you can reject the candidates standing.

But we have no way under the present system of refusing to elect anybody so if you dislike the government and you dislike the opposition you have no means of protesting, so the politician wins every time.

Just think about it for a moment — you haven’t really got a choice and that’s why MPs will continue to abuse the electorate.

I suggest you write to your MP and demand a change in the way we vote but, alas, no one really cares so the farce will continue.

I do hope that some people out there start to think seriously about our so-called democracy Ian Greenhalgh Jesmond Road Bolton