Democracyshouldrule

Dear Editor

Before you vote leave or remain on Thursday, please consider how democratic the EU and Westminster Parliaments are.

All 751 members of the EU Parliament are elected as MEPs and have equal voting rights.

The UK Parliament currently has 1452 members, but only 650 are elected as MPs (44.8 per cent), whilst there are 802 unelected members (55.2 per cent)

After the 2015 Election, the Conservatives had a slender majority of only 12 MPs, but used it to change the law and they banned 117 Welsh, Northern Irish and Scottish MPs from having equal voting rights.

The UK currently has 89 hereditary peers who have parliamentary seats assured purely by accidents of birth, including three who succeeded to peerages before their sixteenth birthdays. There are also 26 Church of England Bishops.

No other European country gives seats to unelected aristocrats and elsewhere, only Iran gives parliamentary seats to religious leaders.

Prime Ministers and political parties regularly give life peerages to their friends, advisors and to former MPs who were defeated in democratic elections as well as to people who donated millions to their parties.

Currently there are 687 life peers, including several who have served criminal prison sentences.

Despite this, the hereditary and life peers can continue to pass laws for the rest of their lives. Name and address supplied