The point of the squeeze message of course is that you have to bang on about it for 5 years for it to sink in by the time of the general election. And general elections are what matter, everything else being glorified opinion polling.

But this is a poor defence. Voters are entitled to literature about the current election not the next one, even if they agree that the next one is the important one.

While the article above concerns Paul Burstow MP, Tom Brake MP, Sarah Ludford MEP and the situation in Sutton, I accept that some people might reasonably be led to believe that I was saying that no Lib Dem anywhere had made any response whatsoever to this issue.

So for the avoidance of any further possible confusion here is a list of everyone concerned and how or whether they have responded:

Paul Burstow MP (Sutton and Cheam): No response. Mr Burstow is my own MP.

Tom Brake MP (Carshalton and Wallington): emailed me on 25 May to say only that I would get a response from Ashley Lumsden, the London agent for the Lib Dems. Mr Lumsden has yet to get in touch.

Sarah Ludford MEP (London region) replied to me by email on 19 May and said: “Dear Mr Short, Thank you for making your views known to me. I do not accept that there are any grounds for complaint. Regards.”

Bridget Fox (Islington South) did not reply to my email of 19 May.

Simon Hughes MP (North Southwark and Bermondsey) did not reply to my email of 15 May.

To my knowledge no other Lib Dem official, MP, MEP or parliamentary candidate has made any other statement on this issue.

I hope this clears up any confusion that may have occurred.

As I wrote on my blog, I have been thoroughly unimpressed with local election literature delivered to me and coverage of the election in the local and national media.

Virtually none of what I have seen or read has made any reference to the real issues at stake at a European election.

Instead our parties have almost exclusively focused on dragging up local or national issues or no relevance to the MEP candidates in the London area.

It is a sad indictment of our already embattled political system that the parties don’t even have sufficient respect for the political process and the intelligence of their electorate to fight a European election on European issues (or at least spell out how their policies in Europe would benefit the UK).

It is interesting (but not surprising) to witness how many politicians bemoan the impact of the expenses scandal on democracy but waste not time in dredging it up in an irrelevant attempt to influence the outcome of a European election.

I did vote, in the end. I tried as best I could to vote in an informed way for an MEP who I judged would best represent my/our interests at a European level.

If only getting hold of that information was a little easier.

(P.S. I did vote, in the end)