I find it astonishing that defecting city council members, Sajjad Malik, Paul Sargent and Tia MacGregor, have the effrontery to continue sitting as bona fide councillors in the wards they abandoned.
They have disenfranchised the voters who elected them.
It is difficult to comprehend a person accepting a public service role, then reneging on it in such an unprincipled manner.
A principled person would offer his or her resignation to facilitate a new, fair and democratic election, allowing the abandoned electorate a further opportunity to select their choice of representative.
The abandoned Liberal Democrat electors will continue being represented by the defectors until the 2008 elections, unless they use their democratic right to challenge them over the contemptuous manner in which they have been disenfranchised.
In addition to remaining unelected councillors, the defectors obviously have no misgivings when taking the extremely generous allowances totalling £8,950.95 provided by the abandoned electors.
It is an erroneous political situation, whereby councillors are not mandated to remain loyal to the people who elected them.
As a result of the defectors' cavalier attitude, any confidence I may have had to register a vote is now destroyed by a more than likely realisation of defection nullifying my vote.
The defectors should reflect on the reason for the disregard of politicians, proven by the lack of public interest and the resultant low vote figures.
John Bullivant Leiden Road Headington Oxford
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