The power of The Press

The lady who organises the delivery of newspapers to our village, has stopped doing so, and we no longer have a daily newspaper. Perhaps this is a simple example of the decline in rural services; when we arrived here there was a milkman and a post office cum village shop, both sadly long gone. For years we have taken The Times, a habit both Tracy and I took up at our separate Universities when they ran a half price for students promotion. Newspapers are there less to provide news than comment today since we get our news from radio, tv and internet so I have enjoyed reading columnists Simon Jenkins, William Rees-Mogg, Mathew Parris, Michael Gove (now a Conservative front bencher), Danny Finkelstein, and even on occasions Mary-Anne Siegart and Mick Hume. Tracy particularly likes Parliamentary sketchwriter Anne Treneman, Caitlin Moran, has a passion for the crossword and Sudoku and so has continued to buy The Times most days.

By contrast I have become a newspaper flirt with a different title each time I go to the newsagents. I have often been told I should read The Telegraph more often (not bad advice while I was coming up in front of selection committees) and another piece of advice was to read the paper of political opponents to better understand and therefore oppose their arguments. So I often buy The Independent or The Guardian and now I come to think of it read both for a while when they were being given away free at the gym. At work the Daily Mirror is often left in the canteen as is The Sun which I will often glance through and not just for the obvious reason. I paid particular attention to The Sun in the run up to the 2005 election when with their strong line on illegal traveller encampments and the asylum seekers, I felt sure that they would come out and support us as we got closer to election day. Of course they didn’t in the end, no doubt because the right contacts hadn’t been established at the highest level, and we were left to rue their decision. What that showed was that, despite the new and more immediate media, The Press still has a big influence and it important that we continue to work closely with them if we want to get our message across in the terms we want. In the meantime, I wonder which paper i will go for tomorrow…….

All part of the job

I spent the early part of tonight with MP Jeremy Wright at his weekly surgery. Jeremy arranges for a councillor to regularly be with him, subject of course to the permission of each constituent attending, to contribute on any matters that might concern the Council. I have assisted Jeremy several times and have found surgery to be one of the most interesting aspects of an MP’s work. People often visit their MP as a matter of last resort or when an issue arises on which they feel strongly and it is often a way of finding out what is really happening. Jeremy is very thorough in his approach and works hard to provide a response, although it may not always be what a constituent wants to hear! One of the things I have enjoyed about being a councillor is being able to help people and I look forward to continuing to do that when I take over from Jeremy as Rugby’s MP.

Sunday morning t v

I watched and listed to the Blair interview with Andrew Marr on Sunday while at the gym. I have been going to the gym at that time for several weeks with my son and have found the Sunday morning political interviews a good way of keeping up with different views. Marr was his usual pussycat self while Blair is increasingly looking like someone who is having to justify his existence. His remarks about teenage gangs, gun crime and the recent report about how our children are growing up reminded me of the observation that you can’t make bad people good simply by passing new laws.

I didn’t catch all of David Davis’s interview with Adam Boulton on Sky because by then I’d moved on to the weights. However I did hear David talking about how gang leaders fear other gang leaders more than the police and how we’ve got to free up the police to bring these criminals to justice. David also has an interesting perspective on the benefits of bringing up children in a stable two parent family due to his own family background.

I didn’t vote for David Davis in the leadership election but since then have been enormously impressed by how he has responded to not achieving his goal. He is a role model in accepting what has happened, supporting a new leader and moving on. He is making the most effective attacks on Labour, John Reid and the shambles that is the Home Office. It will be great for the country to have him as a strong, no nonsense Home Secretary.

Labour waste

I'm indebted to Rugby Councillor, Bill Sewell for sending me this link to an article in the Guardian (didn't know you were a Guardian reader, Bill!) earlier this week about payoffs to Councillors in Scotland. Unbelievable. Whose money is it that's being handed out here?

Rents and taxes

At last night’s Rugby Borough Council meeting it was my role as Housing Portfolio Holder to present budgets for management of the Council’s housing stock for 2007/8. The general fund budgets which will set Council Tax will be debated at the next meeting in March. The most important aspect of the housing budget is the setting of rents for the coming year.

In this role I likened the council to the army being controlled by the Grand Old Duke of York having to march to the Government’s tune with often contradictory directives. One driver is a process called rent re-structuring with an agenda for council house rents to rise to the level of Housing Association rents by 2012. In Rugby this would mean a rise of 6.9%. But another directive imposes a cap of 5% so 5% it is. The one calculation the Government doesn’t ask Rugby to do is the one which shows what the rise would be without all this interference, probably around the rate of inflation.The difference between what is needed and what the Government is forcing the Council to charge goes to Gordon Brown and is effectively another tax which this time is levied on council tenants who are often the poorest members of our community

Rugby has a proud record in the management of its housing stock and doesn’t need micro managing. Why can’t this government trust people locally to get on with delivering the services that local people want?

A new role...

Politicians often spend some time accompanying people in other walks of life or spending time in other people’s shoes. Perhaps one of the most effective was Michael Portillo’s stint as an Asda checkout worker, shown on TV. When I was the candidate in Nuneaton I spent a Friday night shift with the Police in the town centre and some time at the local Hospital. I learnt a great deal from both experiences.
This week I’m having a go at being a single parent. Tracy is in Cornwall, looking after her father who has just has an operation. I’m holding the fort at home looking after our three children still at home while trying to keep my work appointments and get to meetings. Not easy; I’m already chasing my tail and it’s only Monday! The difficulties faced by single parents are often not appreciated and by the end of the week I expect to have an idea of how hard it must be for someone to bring up children on their own.

Clever....

Reported on ConservativeHome today, an extract from The Daily Telegraph's Spy column about David Cameron's speech at a recent Conservative event:

"A relaxed and tieless David Cameron was on top form, cracking jokes at Tony Blair's expense about the cash-for-honours scandal. "The Prime Minister is fond of comparing himself to Margaret Thatcher," said the Tory leader. "But there's a difference between a conviction politician and a politician who's about to get a conviction."

Difficult Decisions No. 1

As a politician, I know that life is full of difficult decisions.

An early one for me, following my selection as Parliamentary Spokesman for Rugby, has been whether to put my name forward as the Conservative Candidate for Dunchurch & Knightlow at the coming elections for Rugby Borough Council. I have been a Councillor for five years and thoroughly enjoyed helping people in my Ward as well as playing my part in the Council, in the Chamber, on panels and in the past year on cabinet as Housing Portfolio holder. My current four year term comes to an end in May this year.

Having taken advice from many people whose opinion I respect, I have reluctantly decided to step down and there are several reasons for my decision. The main one is that I intend to spend all of my energy in ensuring that the Conservatives win the Rugby seat at the next general election, most likely to be held in May 2009. I am still involved in my business, I still like to spend time (occasionally!) with my family and know from my experience as the Candidate in Nuneaton in 2005 there will be much to do dealing with issues and attending events across the constituency. There are only so many hours in each day!

I know that the residents of Dunchurch & Knightlow will continue to be well served by Conservative Councillor, Bill Shields and that with plenty of competition for the Conservative nomination to contest the seat in May, there will soon be another strong Conservative Councillor to speak up for them. In the meantime over the next three months, I will continue to do my best for the people in the Ward and make a constructive contribution in Council.

Fears for Rugby

One of the reasons I was so pleased to be selected as Parliamentary Spokesman for Rugby Conservatives is that Rugby has been my home throughout my life apart from my time at University and a few years working in London immediately afterwards.I’ve seen what life is like elsewhere, and along with Tracy, decided that we wanted to make our home here because it’s a good place to live, work and bring up our children. Like many others we like the character, size and “market town” feel of Rugby.

So the proposals set our in the Regional Spatial Strategy Phase 2 Revision from The West Midlands Regional Assembly are a real concern. The major impact for Rugby is a change in the housing growth options with three annual build rates being being proposed for the period 2001 to 2026. Option 1 of 284 new dwellings per year represents a rate which is less than the past four years; option 2 of 524 is higher, and option 3 of 924 is significantly higher than any figure that has ever previously been contemplated for housing in Rugby. Option 3, if adopted, would lead to the doubling in the size of Rugby over a period of 20 years.

This Government seems to have a thing about this area; not so long ago we were faced with the threat of a massive new airport at Church Lawford and, of course, successfully campaigned against that. Option 3 would involve a similarly fundamental change to our local environment and I will be opposing it strongly. I recognise that Rugby must develop, and take it’s fair share of the house building that is necessary as a consequence of today’s smaller households and the failure to keep up with housing demand over the past ten years (which incidentally is a reason for ever increasing house prices making it more and more difficult for our young people to make a start on the housing ladder). But these proposals are beyond anything that should ever be considered, and I believe they are flawed and not properly thought through.

If you agree, and wish to oppose them you can respond to the questionnaire on the Regional Assembly Website.
You could also sign the online petition organised by Rugby Conservatives by clicking here.