Just recently I have come to realise that I am a very naive person, having been brought up to believe that in a democratic country it is the will of the people that carries the day. In the past, as a nation, we have done our best to spread the philosophy of democracy and even fought wars to defend the democratic rights of ourselves and others.

A recent referendum concluded that the majority of this country wished to leave the European Community. However, many of those who voted to remain in the community are behaving like spoilt children who did not win a prize at the birthday party.

Those who lost are doing all they are able to sabotage the will of the majority, and thereby sabotaging the talks that will eventually start with regard to our departure. These people who are doing all that is possible to rock the boat should remember that we do not always have what we want, and that they are living in a democratic country which believes in true democracy and the will of the people.

These spoilt children who did not win the race will do all they are able to make life a misery for the rest. To those who are doing all in their power to wreck the referendum result I say quite simply: grow up and realise that in life we do not always have what we want.

Colin Bower

Sherwood, Nottingham

The populist right is winning – and Jeremy Corbyn is in denial as to why. He can't acknowledge that a living wage is incompatible with open borders. The unpalatable truth about low pay and insecure jobs is that employers are taking advantage of a ready supply of unskilled migrant labour. Simply curtail unskilled immigration and there will be a transfer of purchasing power from the majority “haves” to the minority “have-nots” as menial jobs that cannot be outsourced abroad become more costly. This is a small price to pay for national cohesiveness.

Nor can Corbyn acknowledge that the welfare state is ultimately incompatible with open borders.

Yugo Kovach

Dorset

A Brexit minister who won't be affected by Brexit is a very fine thing

Vaughan Thomas writes to suggest that Monmouthshire MP, Brexit cheerleader and amateur dental inspector David Davis should resign his seat and face the verdict of his Remain-voting constituency. It is worth noting that, like Nigel Farage, Davis does not have to worry about Brexit: his wife is an EU citizen, so Davis and his family will retain their EU rights after Brexit, unlike the rest of us.

Chris Webster

Abergavenny

Should we care about animal products in the £5 note?

Having raised the question of tallow in the new £5 note, I suggest Mr Maw gets involved in something more useful. He does not have to use these notes, and the minute amount of tallow is from dead animals and undoubtedly goes into other day-to-day products we do not know about.

Relax: be a vegetarian but don't force your views down everyone's throat.

Marlene Maguire

Claygate

Instead of saying that vegetarians and others are stupid for complaining about the new banknote (“Vegetarians being ‘stupid’ for new £5 note animal fat protest, says inventor”, December 3) perhaps the inventor should look at the bigger picture and see what they are really opposing. Undercover footage from some UK slaughterhouses have shown shocking abuse of the animals by workers. In other countries, torture is the only word we would use to describe the treatment of animals inside these killing factories.

Jenny Moxham

Victoria, Australia

We had the wool pulled over our eyes where Syria and Iraq are concerned

Thank goodness for Patrick Cockburn. It has been blindingly obvious to anyone who has been paying attention that the situations in Aleppo and Mosul are mirror images of one another, and yet these two gruesome operations have been reported in completely different ways.

Sadly, re-taking a city while its population is still living there will inevitably lead to civilian casualties, especially if the occupying forces are refusing to allow people to leave. And yet only now are we being allowed to know that the Al-Nusra fighters in East Aleppo have threatened to shoot anyone who is trying to leave, and that there have been significant civilian losses in Mosul. But then, there's none so blind as he who will not see!

Robert Curtis

Birmingham

No sensible person would support an early general election

Can we please stop this talk of an early general election?

The Fixed Term Parliaments Act was one of the best things the Liberal Democrats did in coalition with the Conservatives. It effectively ends the corrupt practice of a government being able to call a general election when it wishes – in other words, when it is ahead in the polls.

We should be very wary of trying to chip away at the already sparse version of democracy we now have in Britain.

Tom Green

Address supplied

Exactly which God does Theresa May believe in?

What do Theresa May, David Cameron, Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher all have in common? Yes, they all have claimed at some point in their careers that a belief in God drives them on to do the “right thing”.

As we know, Thatcher was arguably the most divisive figure in British history and her contribution to society very much depends upon your political viewpoint. But surely anybody who can earn the nickname of “Thatcher the milk snatcher” may not actually be following the teachings of any religion we’ve heard of?

Similarly, Tony Blair has the dubious distinction of sending British troops into battle more times than any other British PM. Cameron left office with an unprecedented and record number of Brits dependent upon food banks for survival. And Theresa May has just implemented the most aggressive, regressive and oppressive “snooping” legislation within the western world, legislation that I bet Castro himself would be shocked by.

Certainly, prime ministers have to take difficult decisions. But really, can we trust a PM to that is influenced to some extent by a belief that “God” would actually approve of those decisions?

Paul Dodenhoff