IT is quite obvious from watching the recent Brexit debates in the House of Commons that many of the Parliamentary procedures are causing the process of exiting the EU to be longer than it needs to be.

One of our local MPs, Helen Goodman, has pointed this out in the Commons on a number of occasions.

As a member of the Procedures Committee she has worked hard by studying the efficiency and effectiveness of the voting systems used in Parliament.

For example, the use of a binary voting system during the two debates about indicative votes was not fit for purpose.

Such a voting system is unlikely to result in just one of the Brexit solutions being identified as the one favoured by MPs. In both debates all eight Brexit solutions were voted down.

The favourite Brexit solution of MPs would have been identified if a preferential voting system had been used. This is where numbers are used to denote a first choice, then a second choice and so on.

Instead, by using an inappropriate voting system, time has been wasted. The government should have listened to Helen Goodman.

Andrew Dowson, Bishop Auckland