Below is an extract from a letter written by Celine Barry, coordinator of Compass North Yorkshire, published in the Yorkshire Post.
A meeting of the Conservative controlled North Yorkshire County Council’s executive on February 7 saw councillors refusing to support a proposal calling on the government to introduce proportional representation (PR) for all future general, local and mayoral elections.
One Tory executive member branded the debate as ‘political posturing’ and ‘peripheral’ to the concerns of the public in North Yorkshire who wanted councillors to be making decisions on housing, health and social care not PR.
I was one of those cross party campaigners who hoped to persuade the NYCC Executive by our reasoned arguments that they should agree to the motion and write to the government to request PR for local, national and mayoral elections.