None of the above

Linda McIlvenna (Letters, 5 May) says she finds the idea of tactical voting “truly appalling”. In a way she is right, but she is wrong to blame us voters.

She says we should vote for the party that best represents our beliefs and values. I am glad she can find one. For decades, I have watched politicians of all parties dodging questions, regressing to prep school during Prime Minister’s Questions, and plucking us to feather their nests. None of this squares with my beliefs and values.

Were politicians angels, the system would still distort our voice. We elect parties in the hope they will prove better than the last lot, then vote them out again, disappointed. Left and right alternate, to damaging effect, each governing on less than half the vote.

A “none of the above” box might help. The job of MP must be the only one where we recruiters cannot reject all the applicants and start again.

Tactical voting is us struggling to make ourselves heard. It is a symptom, not an illness – and it is the illness that is appalling.

George Byron

Comely Bank Avenue

Edinburgh