Dear Mrs May

Why are you leading us into this madness?

Why do you let leave supporters get away with saying an overwhelming majority of the British people voted to leave when actually only 37% of the electorate voted for it, and the majority for leave among those who did vote was less than 4%?

Why did you not start a PR campaign stressing the benefits of EU membership when you became Prime Minister rather than letting the small number of leave supporters in Parliament drive the agenda?

Why are you letting the xenophobic press (Mail, Express, Sun) also drive the agenda? Are you afraid of losing their support for your government? You could accept some of this as the Labour party is in such disarray. Or are you afraid of UKIP, another party which seems to be permanently in disarray?

Why are you pandering to the majority of older people who mostly voted leave? Surely you should be thinking about the young people who mostly voted to remain. It’s their future, not the future of retirees, some of whom will be dead before an agreement is reached.

What are you doing about the lack of knowledge among some leave voters, like the man interviewed by the BBC a few weeks ago who thought we had already left the EU, or the woman, when asked about Article 50, just said “I don’t know, I don’t follow it”?

How do you think that leaving the EU will help the problems of those who voted leave because they were feeling left behind? Surely there is a disconnect here, particularly, as predicted, there will be a downturn in the economy after we leave. Surely you should be doing something positive to help them like encouraging more investment from foreign companies like Japanese car manufacturers who can then easily market to the rest of the EU.

Why didn’t you, and why don’t you start a PR campaign stressing the benefits of immigration? It seems that many of the areas of the country that voted leave don’t have many immigrants and so have little knowledge of how immigrants are contributing to the economy and paying taxes.

Why are you letting people think that increased numbers of immigrants are the cause of the current problems in the NHS when these problems are caused by chronic underfunding and lack of strategic planning for all the aspects of health care?

Why are you jeopardising the international reputation of our university system, by cutting off a major funding source for leading-edge research in medical, scientific and other areas, and closing down opportunities for cross-fertilisation of ideas? Surely this will lead to a brain drain and a worsening education system for the next generation of students.

Why are you making such a song and dance about a possible trade deal with New Zealand, a country of 4.5 million people halfway round the world, when we already have a market of 500 million people on our doorstep?

When are you going to acknowledge that the value of the pound has weakened substantially, and to consider what the impact will be when prices will begin to rise substantially once the period of currency hedging (fixing future exchange rates) by major businesses has expired.

How are we going to staff the NHS if immigration is curtailed?

By how much is the cost of food going to rise if there is no longer any casual immigrant labour for picking and processing fruit and vegetables?

How is our hospitality industry going to cope without the mass of immigrant labour which is now staffing it, when tourism is such a major source of income in this country?

Are you really going to pander to Trump, an unpredictable and self-aggrandising popularist, and do a trade deal with the US to

• let American healthcare and insurance companies muscle in on the NHS and stop people with certain conditions being treated
• roll back regulations so that we have fracking and other polluting industries in our beautiful British countryside
• allow the import of more foods which have been treated with hormones and modified genetically

I have lived in the US and seen all this. I’m sure you aready know this but I will point out again that healthcare costs consume twice as much of GDP in the US as in the UK and life expectancy is lower.

What will happen to British farming if the EU subsidies are no longer there? Will farmers become unemployed and our beautiful countryside become overgrown if it is no longer managed for farming?

Why are you interpreting “take back control” as giving it to right-wingers in your party who appear to care little for the tolerant society for which Britain has had such a strong reputation?

Why are you leading us into this madness?

Please stop and think about the future of our country.