Your editorial (The government has failed. It’s time to go back to the people, 9 January) pinpoints many issues as to why the UK voted to leave the EU in 2016, but then perversely creates the wrong solution to the clear and decisive voice of the British people.

The dispossessed were given a voice as the sovereignty of parliament was transferred to its citizens via a referendum. The UK has respected every decision of every referendum in the past. Our remain top-heavy parliament is creating difficulties for itself; the answer is to listen more carefully to the people and not to ask the people to speak more clearly.

Your call for humility on behalf of those who failed to hear the people’s cry is not best displayed by not fulfilling the instructions of those very same people who we recognise have had enough.

The Guardian wants to see a reformed UK in a reformed EU, but it is evident that the EU is not for reforming other than to continue its repetitive march towards the United States of Europe that you say you do not want. The EU is simply not for turning away from closer integration on finances, foreign policy, defence structures and ever closer integration as it engineers the tools that in the end create our ultimate governance from a remote, undemocratic, elitist Brussels. It failed to heed the overtures from David Cameron in 2016, and it is on broadcast mode only as we try to negotiate our withdrawal from its institutions.

The Guardian too is on broadcast mode. We must respect our own tools of democracy, and simply because parliament is in contempt of the people is not sufficient reason to further enrage those who have spoken to ask for greater clarity on what they meant when they said “enough” of this project.

Entrepreneur and international hotelier Rocco Forte, writing on the same day in another publication, writes lucidly about the strengths of the UK economy and its significant standing in the world. He is confident about the steps that need to be taken to deliver on the vote and our continued and expansive role with the rest of the world. He points out that the EU sold £341bn of goods to us last year and the leverage that our £95bn deficit with the EU gives us if only we used it.

So instead of dressing up our disappointment in the result of the people’s vote of 2016, and pretending that failing to listen to its call is ultimately nothing other than Orwellian doublespeak, let us embrace the opportunities that have been offered by the boldness and astuteness of our ultimate bosses: the people. To deny them their Brexit would certainly be the worst of all worlds and would most certainly put us in uncharted waters – and the repercussions of that would be dire.

Nigel Evans MP

Conservative, Ribble Valley

• Your leader makes good points, but is once again based on the assertion, also maintained in the past by the Observer, that the referendum result was valid – “We accepted, without enthusiasm, that leave had won”. Thanks largely to the investigative reporting for which the Scott Trust is revered and supported, we know that a number of factors subverted the referendum. Several of these abuses were claimed, indeed claimed by the perpetrators themselves, to have swung the narrow result; the fact that they did so when added together must now be almost certain. At the very least they render the result unsafe as a premise upon which to decide the fate of our nation.

Surely the Guardian and the Observer should change their stance on this vital issue in the light of the evidence to which they have themselves contributed with such distinction. Then we will have more hope that our elected representatives will change their stance as well.

James Willis

Alton, Hampshire

• Your editorial on Brexit omits to mention a key factor that is used to argue against a second referendum – that to hold one would disrespect the democratic will of the people. Such a view ignores two glaringly obvious facts. One, the leave majority was extremely slim and therefore cannot be considered to represent a single “will of the people”. Two, democracy was gloriously disrespected by those who made promises that have turned out to be fanciful at best and blatant falsehoods at worst. Now that the people have seen enough evidence upon which to base their rational judgment, their democratic right to express it must be restored.

Dr Allan Dodds

Bramcote, Nottinghamshire

• Your leading article supports some mechanism such as that used recently in Ireland. This is potentially crucial for the future of this country in two particular ways. First, it addresses the basic question of who is fitted to guide our country’s policy, and brings in the principle of randomness. Random selection applies no filters: not gender, not race, not education, not class, not wealth, not family connection. It therefore is revolutionary in, at last, assuming equal citizenship. Who owns the country? All its citizenry.

Second, the mechanism includes study of the issues. It brings together a number of citizens small enough over a reasonable period of time to become well informed on the principles and technicalities involved. It is not a marketing campaign, but an educational enterprise. I rejoice.

Howard Hilton

Audlem, Cheshire

• Your front page (9 January) carried these messages, in an extract from your editorial: 1) “The message must be that this country needs a new and fairer deal” I believe that is true; 2) “and that this is best guaranteed by a better Britain in a better Europe.” I believe that is true; 3) “The government has failed” I believe that is true; 4) “… so we must go back to the people.” If that means a second referendum, I believe that is not true.

The 2016 referendum was ill conceived by a government desperate to dig itself out of a hole, Is that different now? It was badly executed. The wrong question was asked of the wrong electorate at the wrong time. Would that be different now? It was intended as advisory but treated as binding. Is that different now? If you aren’t convinced yet, perhaps you watched the film Brexit which showed an eminently repeatable set of events. So what should happen?

I believe that parliament, the ultimate law-making body in the UK, should revoke its article 50 notice, so prematurely sent, and the whole sorry mess would end. Government response to the question “Can article 50 be revoked?” has been: “It’s not government policy”. Presumably that means “yes”. So, that’s what we should do now. And later, when the dust has settled, have a real people’s vote in a general election.

Celia Wilson

Didcot, Oxfordshire

• Your editorial suggests that it is time to take the matter of Brexit out of parliament and back to the people. I agree. However, you appear to avoid calling for the traditional mechanism of a general election and instead suggest a somewhat convoluted process of a citizens’ assembly followed at some point by a reconfigured second referendum. The problem is that if the discussion takes place in the same climate as we currently have, the conclusion is likely to be much the same. That’s why I, and no doubt other Guardian readers, will be gathering at Portland Place in London on Saturday to join the people’s assembly march. It will call for the much-heralded end to austerity to actually happen and challenge the rise of racism. Both of these are essential prerequisites for a more a rational Brexit debate.

Keith Flett

London

• The issue should be decided by intelligent, well-informed people from across the political and cultural spectrum of parliament. If their decision reverses Brexit and attracts the ire of vehement Brexiters, so be it. It won’t be the first time parliament has ignored the so-called public will.

Michael Heaton

Warminster, Wiltshire

• For once, a leading article that leads: thank you. You should give credit where it’s due by acknowledging that it was Gordon Brown who put the idea of a citizens’ assembly on the table in his November speech at the Institute for Government.

Willy McCourt

London

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