It is hardly surprising that the Liberal Democrats were hammered more than the Tories in the council elections. People who voted Tory in the general election were in favour of Tory policies (Lib Dems vent fury at Cameron as party suffers election rout, 6 May). Lib Dem voters had expectations of very different policies. To vote Labour was to vote for quasi-Tory policies, given the record of the previous administrations; to vote Lib Dem or Green seemed the only hope of endorsing policies which would protect the welfare state and support growth in the economy.
Instead, the Lib Dems have connived in the most ferocious attack on the welfare state since its inception. It is as if the 1930s never happened and Keynes never wrote. Voters have a choice of parties offering varieties of the same neo-conservative fallacies, designed to pour tax-payers' money into the pockets of private companies and to transfer wealth from the poor to the rich. There is a desperate need for a party of the left. If Labour would ditch the "New" bit we could have a two-party system that might work.
Hazel Davies
Notre Dame du Bec, France
• Mr Clegg, wake up! As a Lib Dem that has campaigned since the days of Paddy Ashdown, I believed the Lib Dems to be a party of honesty and integrity; that they could have been the answer to the countries' problems. Yet you have let us all down. You have become a mainstream politician with mainstream political views. We need a self-respecting man who stands by his promises and convictions – or give way to a better man. Ditch the Tories, stand for what you believe in and win back our votes.
Philip Chilvers
Thrapston, Northamptonshire
• The results make one thing clear to Liberal Democrats: we cannot rely on coalition success to provide the basis for our general election stance. The Micawber-like optimism of Danny Alexander and others only demonstrates the despair of this position. It is high time to put the party first. We must start work on developing radical, redistributive and left-leaning policies members truly believe in. Continue in coalition, certainly. But Lib Dem ministers should be seen holding their noses in distaste, explaining the sacrifices they are making for the sake of the nation. Like Labour in 1945, Lib Dems can emerge from coalition with an election-winning platform.
Jonathan Hunt
Party First campaign
• The election results confirm what most Lib Dems knew: although it was right to enter the coalition it was wrong to give ground on so much right-wing ideology. Sadly, David Cameron has twisted Nick Clegg round his little finger and, as a result, Clegg has done more harm to centre-left politics than anyone since David Owen. What we need to do now is clear: 1) Plan for an orderly withdrawal from the coalition in about 12 months' time. 2) Then hold a leadership election – Clegg can stand again if he wants to. 3) Face a general election with some vestige of integrity restored.
Cllr Peter Balaam
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire
• For the past few months Manchester has been singled out for crude and targeted attacks from coalition leaders and ministers. We had everything thrown at us, from made-up figures about our finances to imaginary posts in the town hall, like a "twitter tsar". We were accused of treating Manchester as a political laboratory so that we could force through political cuts to embarrass the government. Manchester has now spoken. In a historical sweep of candidates all Liberal Democrat councillors up for election were swept away for these deceits. Manchester is not just a Tory-free zone; we are now heading towards a Lib Dem-free zone.
Cllr Pat Karney
Manchester Labour Group
• While some Lib Dems are questioning Clegg's leadership, the big issue for Labour is what to do about the directionless and passionless Labour leadership. How could Labour have fared so badly in the context of severe cuts and services and the plainly grim and incompetent Tories? Miliband has failed to offer a coherent challenge to the ConDems and he has done a very poor job in opposition. He and the Labour party have more to learn than anyone following the local elections. He is just not up to the job.
Norman Hanson
Bingham, Nottinghamshire
• Martin Kettle pinpoint's "Labour's infinitely stubborn tribalist tendency" (Comment, 6 May), a tendency to which I am proud to belong. The Labour movement's work is far from complete. The poor and the powerless are not only still with us, the agonies of many of their young – driven to drugs, alcohol, obesity by the demoralising culture in which they live – are dismissed by our Victorian government as being self-inflicted. Our stubborn tendency will not rest till we have made a society where the young don't turn to drugs for escape, where self-styled liberal democrats don't prop up brutalising ideologies out of vanity, and where irreversible changes make a better land. Only my No vote to AV could ensure we don't have to suck up to anyone for a second-place, diluting our courage, tenacity, hope and vision.
Dr Ian Flintoff
Oxford
• How appropriate that Paddy Ashdown laments it will "never again be glad confident morning". His quote is, of course, from that fine poem The Lost Leader in which Robert Browning decries Wordsworth's desertion of liberal causes and his selling-out to the Tory establishment and values ("Just for a handful of silver he left us,/ Just for a riband to stick in his coat..."). Those of us on the left would advise the Lib Dems to return to their radical roots and abandon the coalition before further damage is done to them and the majority of people in Britain.
George McLean
Manchester