This feels like a painfully long wait for the ballot box

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

This Tory government’s unwillingness to talk with unions is clearly not working (PA Wire)

Not only is the government not talking to large numbers of their constituents with regard to legitimate pay and conditions claims, but they’re also planning to introduce legislation to prevent many of them from exercising an already well-regulated right to withdraw their labour in support of those claims.

This Tory government’s unwillingness to talk to the unions is clearly not in the public interest and their proposed legislation is a direct result of it. The situation with regard to the understaffed NHS is conspicuously damaging. An entreaty to work harder hardly seems appropriate.

The strikers themselves are members of the public and hard-working constituents, many with families to house, feed and clothe. Their fraught situation is a direct result of nearly 13 years of Tory governance, accompanied by a notably damaging "fiscal event" and a large helping of Brexit "benefits" on the side.

A frugal true blue meal, more force fed than oven ready, served up daily in these spartan times – and apparently served up in silence. It seems a painfully long wait for the ballot box.

David Nelmes 

Newport

Disturbing Westminster sexism

Maya Oppenheim’s article in Monday’s Independent detailing toxic sexism in Westminster is extremely alarming.

How can we possibly tackle the continued sexism in our society when our political leaders set such a terrible example? The mindset has to change here, and our female MPs are the answer. They must unite across all the parties and fight back, refusing to accept any level of sexism from their male counterparts.

The men who think it’s OK to behave like this must be named and shamed and cleared out of politics. More generally, the education system must surely be the focal point for the behavioural change we need to move forward.

Paul Morrison

Glasgow

General election now

It seems very odd that this government has time to discuss removing workers’ rights but has been unable to have meaningful discussions about pay and the crisis in the NHS.

It is also difficult to comprehend that the rich are allowed to get away with withholding their tax with non-dom status or stashing their millions in places like the Cayman Islands, but our workers are demonised for withholding their labour.

The general election can’t come quickly enough. Maybe then a fairer society will be possible.

Susan Lammin

Dumfries

Shameless and naked

The government’s assertion that striking ambulance drivers or firefighters somehow need to be compelled by law to leave a picket line to save someone’s life is insulting. It adds insult to the injury of years of underinvestment in public services, and is an attempt to demonise those who not so long ago we were being encouraged to clap as heroes.

Do we want key workers to feel so degraded and unwanted that they walk away, rather than paying them their worth?

It also sticks a wedge under the door to erode the rights of everyone else who suffers low pay or poor conditions, by empowering bad employers and lowering standards – not only for all of us as employees, but also as service users and consumers.

Other workers’ rights will follow these onto the bonfires. It is the cousin of other draconian measures such as the requirement for voter IDs to solve the nonexistent problem of voter impersonation. This government has no clothes and no shame.

Ian Henderson

Norwich

The key to a plastic-free future

It is set to be a do-or-die year in the fight against plastic pollution. In May, Paris will play host to the second round of vital negotiations on the fine print of the world’s first global treaty on plastic. Get it wrong and future generations will be forced to foot a bill.

As we approach the middle of the 2020s, the world is urgently seeking genuine solutions to our most shameful environmental crises. Fortunately, the world is not short of creative minds.

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation estimates there are some 160 million designers and creative thinkers. These workers are responsible for designing the products and services that are sold to consumers worldwide.

We now need to design differently. But to date, these powerful creatives have struggled to find clarity in the minefield of greenwash and misinformation on alternative materials and system solutions.

They clutch at “less bad” rather than feel empowered to push for radical rethinks. Consumers simply want to be sold the right thing and designers need the tools to make this possible.

Armed with the right knowledge, the world’s designers should be the answer to the plastics crisis and more. Together we must empower them to challenge the status quo, and build a regenerative economy that uses Nature’s abundant resources, plastic free and toxin free.

Sian Sutherland

Co-founder, A Plastic Planet

A modern history lesson

I was never a keen historian, but I do remember that – several decades ago, after a very contentious police strike – a deal was made that if the police service relinquished their right to strike, the pay scales would be enhanced to offset this option.

I also seem to recall from very recent history surrounding our Brexit tribulations that business leaders were advised by the government that to overcome staff shortages, they needed to pay salaries that would attract and keep staff.

At the present time, a number of public sector and care workers are either voting with their feet and leaving for alternative employment or taking up their right to strike for both increased pay and to highlight the precarious levels of staffing within their professions.

For any politician to say that NHS staff, teachers or those in the care sectors did not exceed all realistic expectations during the pandemic is outrageous. To further suggest that any future pay rise would be subject to increased productivity is offensive and unethical.

Am I the only member of the voting public to think that a great number of our political administration have a very poor knowledge of modern history and are deluded, unprofessional and lacking integrity in the direction in which they are leading this country and its citizens?

John Blake

Dorset