Our readers from across the county give their weekly take on the biggest issues impacting Kent and beyond.

Some letters refer to past correspondence which can be found by clicking here. Join the debate by emailing letters@thekmgroup.co.uk

Rural areas have escaped major development

The new government has been in office for four weeks.

Since 2010, food bank parcels have risen from 100,000 per annum to 3.1m. Potholes in our highways and sewage in our rivers and seas have become headline news for the first time since the great stink of 1858.

Tenants are being evicted in greater numbers and citizens’ advice suggests that 50% of privately rented homes are excessively cold’ damp and mouldy.

I won't mention the increase in flytipping, the permanent inconvenience of operation Brock and the Dover TAP, or the poor performance of large parts of the NHS and social services in Kent, because that would be to rub salt into the wound.

Now, who has been in charge in Kent for most of its 138-year existence? Who was in government from May 2010 until July this year?

If things are not right we know who to thank. Perhaps, a period of silence on the part of KCC’s councillors Gough and Vinson would be welcome, as their activities have done quite enough to make our lives less sunny.

In many rural areas there has not been any significant development for at least 20 years. The urban areas of Kent have taken the brunt of any development, especially in East Kent, and if there is any concreting over Kent happening, it's in districts like Thanet with 15.9% of the land under development, compared to under 6% in some parts of West Kent.

If houses are being built of low quality in design and construction and if physical and social infrastructure is missing when new housing is built, it is because planning policy has been led by numbers and the fear of a referral to the planning inspectorate in the last 14 years.

We have a housing crisis. I hope the new government can do better, if not, they will suffer the torments of rejection that the previous incumbents received.

Richard Styles

Working from home is here to stay

WFH (working from home) came into its own during the pandemic as a necessary means to facilitate interactions between employees and employers through virtual communication.

But post-Covid, WFH has embedded itself as a permanent fixture for many public service workers. There is, of course, the attraction of not having to endure the daily commute to the office or to meet the cost of public transport or petrol for those who choose to travel in their cars.

And working from the comfort of their home benefits their family life, especially if they have young children.

However, a recent study which was published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine found WFH decreased overall physical and mental well-being as a result of workers getting less physical exercise, eating a poorer diet, communicating less with co-workers and having to cope with the distractions of children in the home.

Being divorced from the social interplay between other workers can also lead to isolation and loneliness.

Other countries in Europe have adopted WFH. In fact, the Netherlands was the first country to enshrine it in law that workers have the legal right to WFH.

Now that the die is cast WFH, whatever its negative or positive attributes, will be the principal aspect of employment as it endorses flexibility.

Michael Smith

Shocked by brazen shoplifting

I’m appalled at the amount of shoplifting that goes on unabated in front of my very eyes, with the stores and police failing to do anything about it.

I’ve seen episodes of shoplifting going on quite regularly of late but what angers me is that the bosses of these stores appear to be quite happy for it to continue, at the same time forcing the good people of this country who pay for their goods to end up footing the bill by increased prices.

A well-known supermarket near me has a shoplifter going in every day and stealing hundreds of pounds of alcohol.

It should be almost impossible for someone to leave a store without first of all paying for it.

It’s got to the situation where expensive items such as meat are having to have security tags placed on them. But does that stop the thieves? Not a bit.

They load up their trolleys and brazenly walk out without a care in the world, because they know nothing will happen to them other than at worst a telling-off by the police.

Sid Anning

Bones shaken by the state of our roads

The earliest bicycles, invented in the late 1860s, had wrought iron frames and wooden wheels surrounded by iron ‘tyres’ and had no springs, which made for a very uncomfortable ride and they quickly earned the nickname ‘boneshakers’.

That term could well be applied to most of our buses these days - not because of the buses themselves but the appalling state of our roads.

I lived in Australia for many years and the unmetalled roads in the outback made for a smoother ride.

With very few exceptions, bus journeys are bone-jarring - and very noisy, the latter largely due to rattling of windows and handrails.

Anyone with back problems should prepare themselves for a very painful and unpleasant experience. It must be purgatory for them.

On Monday this week I had the misfortune to take a bus to East Grinstead - it was without a doubt the most uncomfortable ride of my life (I’m an octogenarian) - 48 minutes each way of pure hell!

I’m surprised that bus operators have not taken out class action suits against local authorities for damage to their vehicles as a result of their allowing our roads to deteriorate to such an extent that they are now a national disgrace.

Britain is a First World country with roads that would put a Third World country to shame.

Bob Readman

Protests serve only to antagonise

We've seen a glut of protests in recent years from groups such as Just Stop Oil.

They've pulled various stunts to emphasize their cause, anticipating the publicity generated by the media would keep their issue at the forefront of the public's minds.

But their means of drawing attention to themselves by engaging in acts of vandalism and civil disobedience which has included wilful attacks on paintings in art galleries, has only had a negative effect.

The irony being that, instead of winning over the general public, the activists have set in motion a wave of antagonism towards them and the issues they are campaigning for are overlooked to a large extent, as people focus on their disreputable deeds rather than what has given rise to them.

Michael Smith

Justice not seen to be done

Our judicial system yet again is difficult to understand.

A driver with no insurance hits and kills a little boy and drives off and gets a suspended sentence.

M25 environmental protestors cause no loss of life and some inconvenience to the public and get four to five years.

Is a child’s life so cheap?

Angela Walder

We don’t like extremists on right or left

Being British, or worse still English, means that you get used to things being a little bit rubbish from time to time.

By any standards, Britain PLC has failed so spectacularly and so constantly that it has become embarrassing. When given the opportunity, the voters tossed out the incumbent government, in a big way.

It is true that the first past the post election system favoured Labour by giving them proportionally more seats than their share of the vote would suggest. Normally it is the Conservatives whose vote is distributed more efficiently and who garner more seats for a given percentage of votes.

With a low turnout and a very non-proportional distribution of seats, perhaps a proportional representation system might be considered.

Britain is very slow to reform its election systems and form of government, so expect resistance from the 'we've always done it this way brigade', and if change does occur, be careful what you wish for.

Coalition governments will be much more likely and politics may be less tidy, if not more efficient. You will also have to accept that extremes of right and left will get greater representation, but as the coalitions built into the current party systems are becoming more unhinged (Johnson, Truss and Corbyn), it might be said that the current foundations of our political system are shaky, if not broken.

It is often said that the British people are conservative in outlook, which has the ring of truth, as they have elected more Conservative governments in the last 100 years than Labour but there are limits. Britain is a country of centres, of middles and extremism of either the left or the right is not attractive to them.

Sometimes such as renationalising the railways and even more so returning the water industry to public ownership, might seem radical and out of character, but only because there were decades when shareholder value and excessive rewards for executives were not the order of the day.

In most other matters, Britain is cautious and slightly socially conservative. Starmer knows this and this is why he acts as he does.

Richard Styles

Individuals are overshadowing their parties

The latest political news from the United States draws attention to the state of democracy in the Western World.

One man, Joe Biden, has the ability to decide who will be the next President of the USA and thus leader of the so-called free world. At least one man made the decision that to stop Trump you had to assassinate him.

This appears to be a trend in politics in this country as well. Individuals are becoming more important than parties or policies. It was Johnson’s Conservative Party, Starmer’s Labour Party and Farage’s Reform Party.

Over the years I have witnessed changes in local government. I have seen the committee structure, through which all councillors were involved in decisions, replaced by cabinet government through which only a select group of councillors are involved in decisions. The remaining councillors have very little input into those decisions. Even the scrutiny system is an ineffective mechanism.

The trend has worsened with great stress now laid upon mayors with whom power now rests in most major cities.The belief is that power should reside with individuals who are able to dominate their ‘parties’ and are all powerful in terms of party and political decisions in their areas.

It is little wonder that 40% of the electorate see no point in voting at elections.

Democracy within parties is rapidly declining as those who wish to question or challenge the ruling ideas are more likely to be expelled than listened to.

If democracy is to mean government of the people by the people, there is a need to rethink and redesign our political structures.

Ralph A. Tebbutt

We don’t need more Reform MPs

In his letter, C. Aichgy made the point that the Lib Dems received 12% of the national vote and a disproportionate 72 seats in the House of Commons. Having done so well under the present system, he rightly wondered if they would continue their call for the introduction of PR.

Part of his letter drew attention to the fact that the new political party, Reform UK, received 14% of the vote and secured just five seats.

This to me highlights not only the fact that the present voting system is unfair but more importantly that we now have a party on the political stage, which publicly espouses radical policies which reflect the views of a significant number of voters. These include returning all cross-channel migrants to France, supporting low taxation and more controversially, opposing a net-zero energy policy.

Led by the charismatic populist, Nigel Farage, its astonishing success in the general election has underlined the fact that it is now a force with which to be reckoned.

Previously, like the Lib Dems, I have been a supporter of PR but the fact that it would have given Reform UK a mind-boggling 94 seats has made me change my mind.

So yes, I’m sure the Lib Dems will quietly silence their call for the introduction of PR and I am with them on that. With Reform UK’s small representation in Parliament, to me it’s a question of safety in small numbers.

John Cooper

Don’t make light of Trump shooting

The disgusting attempt on the life of Donald Trump, when considered in conjunction with the physical intimidation experienced by a number of candidates in our recent general election, makes clear how far the practice of democracy in our two countries is under threat.

It is fortunate that we do not have a gun culture as exists in the USA, as we would certainly have seen fatalities during the run-up to the vote here.

While there are always lunatics at both extremes of the political spectrum, as proved by the attacks on Jo Cox and Sir David Amess, it is apparent that the most worrying threats are coming from those on the left who do not recognise any limits on political debate.

One may disagree profoundly with opponents, but to use force in an effort to silence them is something which has not disfigured debate here since the days of Oswald Mosley but which does frequently occur in other, less developed nations.

It is particularly deplorable that some so-called celebrities and comedians, have been prepared to make light of such actions, provided of course that their targets are opposed to the prevailing liberal consensus. At the end of that road lies anarchy.

Colin Bullen

Do Labour voters regret their choice?

The last election was not a vote for Labour, but a vote against the Conservatives. Indeed, as a 75-year-old man, I believe that the 2024 general election was the largest ‘vote against’ election I have witnessed in my lifetime.

As the statistics make clear, there was no impassioned desire for a Labour government. On a voter turn out of just 60% (the lowest since 2001) just a third of those who voted chose to vote Labour, and if any further evidence is needed, Sir Keir Starmer’s vote in his own constituency collapsed by over 17%. He failed to achieve even 50% of those who voted, compared to the 66% he achieved in 2019.

I suspect that already some Labour voters are beginning to regret their decision, because I am sure they did not vote for increased immigration and the granting of asylum to nearly 100,000 immigrants, just so the government can claim it has cleared the backlog.

I am also sure they did not want to hear that the government will expect every area of the country to take its share (as if Kent and Medway are not struggling to cope already) even if that means that many of the 1.5 million houses Labour wants to build could be allocated to asylum seekers on the basis of need.

C. Aichgy

Politics becoming diverse and polarised

Mr Wallace states that "the number of Labour votes increased" (letters last week); this is not strictly true as, although the percentage of votes increased by 1.6%, the actual total votes obtained by Labour, compared to 2019, reduced by over half a million as stated by Mr Helm in his letter.

It is true that Labour obtained the most votes, but this was still only one third of the total. Not quite the overwhelming change that was widely forecast and reported.

In another letter, Mr Aichgy suggests that if the number of votes cast were used under a PR system, two major alliances would be formed to create a government. The larger of these alliances would still only have 298 seats, not as I understand it enough to form a government. Another party, or parties, would need to join an alliance.

The bartering to obtain more than the required 326 seats would see either the smaller parties having a disproportional influence or a hung parliament, neither a good outcome. This could also happen under first past the post, so neither system is without problems.

The current system is unfair but until a better system is proposed I support it as it is straightforward to understand and implement. As politics are becoming more diverse and polarised the whole election system may have to be rethought.

Brian Barnard