ON leaving the polling booth after deliberately invalidating my ballot paper to vote on an issue of supreme indifference to the electorate, namely Police Commissioners, I pondered.

What, may I ask, was wrong with the old Police Watch Committees?

I could not help but wonder what the turnout would have been rather than the 14 per cent, had us plebeians been given the opportunity to vote on a couple of issues that really do concern us.

I refer to our continued membership of the European Union and the thorny issue of gay marriage.

One cannot help but get the impression that the leaders of the main political parties feel that those issues are far too important to be left to the common electorate to decide.

God forbid, they could well vote to pull out of the EU and that they wanted no truck with gay marriage and that would never do!

CHRIS TAYLOR Hanley Castle