Scrap the Westminster whipping system | Letters

Martin Luck and Vaughan Thomas respond to suggestions that Andy Burnham could reduce the use of whipping in parliament You suggest Andy Burnham might reduce the extent of whipping of parliamentary votes (What will ‘change’ look like if Andy Burnham becomes prime minister? 19 June). I have long thought that whipping should apply only to matters clearly spelled out in a party’s manifesto. After all, that is what non-independent candidates stood on when they were elected. Votes on other matters should be free, with the party free to persuade its MPs by appealing to strategy and force of argument. This would also have the democratic advantage of encouraging MPs to take the views of their constituents fully into account and contributing those views to the party debate. Under current practice, MPs can too easily become vote fodder and may not even fully understand what they are being asked to vote on. Voting by conscience on a non‑manifesto issue should be seen as a matter of pride and should attract respect, not approbation or feelings of disloyalty. Defining whippable matters in this way would have a further logical consequence: MPs who defect from one party to another would have to su