NO doubt after this week's elections there will be the usual concerns expressed about a low turn-out and voter apathy in local democracy.

Politicians - local and national - exhort us to take an active interest in local politics, but in fact they do little themselves to encourage participation other than by pushing leaflets through letter boxes.

There is a flurry of such leaflets before elections and occasionally a canvasser calls to ask which way I will vote. At no time, however, in the 11 years I have lived in Malvern has any councillor or candidate sought my views on any local issue or attempted to discuss local issues with me.

Council wards are not large and I would have thought any conscientious councillor or sincere candidate would make it their business to work their way round a ward over the space of a year or two, talking to as many voters as they can. There will be people, of course, who do not have the time to talk at length, but others will be glad to meet their representatives, raise concerns, and give their views on local matters.

Perhaps if local politicians showed a willingness to converse, listen and learn, as well as telling us about their policies, people would become more actively interested in, and informed about, local politics and more likely to vote.

ANDREW McKAY, Delamere Road, Malvern.