Having read the letter by Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP (‘Put an end to the safe seats’, Your Views, April 7), espousing the wonders of AV as a “fairer” voting system, I am wondering if this was intended for publication on April 1.

In her position, as an unelected peer, a political appointee, she enjoys power and patronage without democratic mandate. As an MEP she was shoehorned into power by a voting system where often we don’t even know who we are going to get.

As an MEP she has just voted to massively hike her allowances, which are on top of those she gets as a peer. To write that our current system is “unfair” and that it creates “safe seats” is the height of cant and hypocrisy.

And what of the EU, why no comment on that other insult to democracy and accountability, the unelected European Commission gravy train? Made up of appointed political failures, placemen and toadies past their sell-by date, who foisted EU “President” Van-Rumpoy on us, without even the pretence of a democratic vote for us, the plebs? No prizes.

Where was she when that same unelected European Commission rejected the decisive and democratic Irish Referendum no vote, insisting on a rerun until the EU got the “right” result? This is democracy Mugabe style.

With the first past the post system we know exactly who we are getting and can retain or chuck them out in a clear, simple and transparent manner. For me and most others there is no “alternative” to our choice on the voting paper. Why should we “rank” in order of preference, candidates, to whom we wouldn’t give the time of day?

I would suggest that in the circumstances, Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP is the very last person to lecture us on democracy and is the living embodiment of why we must turn out in force on May 5 to vote no to AV.

Jeremy Zeid
Brampton Grove, Kenton