I am very grateful to the voters in Lymm who have put their faith in me to represent the ward for the next four years on Warrington Borough Council. The result is:

Lymm Ward May 2010

                                                     %  
Bob Barr                LD      2932     42
Harish Sharma     Con      2660     38
Su Williams          LAB      1363      20
  
Total                                 6955               Turnout 75%

I will work hard to represent Lymm and to ensure that the village gets its fair share of resources.
  

Below you will find the official statement issued by Warrington Borough Council on 28th April 2010 to clarify the current position with regard to Walton Hall Estate and gardens:

This note is intended to give an overview of the process the Council is currently pursuing for the restoration of Walton Hall estate. 

In 2008 the Council’s Executive Board agreed to explore the potential of the estate in order to preserve it for future generations. This would be a mix of commercial opportunities as well as enhancing the current range of facilities.

The main buildings within the estate are in a poor condition, particularly the Glasshouse and Equestrian Hall. The Council does not have the financial resources available to restore these buildings. We do not want the estate to decline. Unfortunately, external grant funding has not yet been forthcoming. Therefore, we feel it is necessary to explore other options to secure a viable future for the estate.

Like most other public parks, the Council has to maintain Walton from existing budgets. We would wish the estate to be self-financing and viable into the future through a mix of commercial activities appropriate for a park environment. Last year, the Council explored what interest could be generated through a national advertising campaign to deliver these aspirations.

We have followed appropriate formal procurement processes and discussed opportunities with a number of businesses and interested parties. The detail will be reported to the Council’s Executive Board this summer as a precursor to further public consultation.

The estate will not be sold. It is our intention that the public will continue to enjoy access throughout the estate at all times.

The council’s aspiration can be identified as three interrelated components:

1. Commercial development of the main Hall and ancillary buildings.
2. Improved golf facilities through the creation of an Academy.
3. Creative direction for the parkland through a master planning process.

The benefits to the public can be summarised as follows:

• Preserve the estate for future generations
• Improved access to the range of buildings within the estate not previously enjoyed
• Greater diversity of leisure interests
• Improved visitor experience

The Council anticipates that the timescale to achieve the above is as follows:

Summer 2010 Executive Board to select preferred partner(s) for the development of the estate

Summer 2010 Public consultation

Autumn 2010 Planning Application for main phase of development, including public participation

Spring 2011 Commence refurbishment of Walton Hall estate heritage

Spring 2011 Finalise master plan

End

In last night’s debate David Cameron criticised the Liberal Democrats for proposing to charge VAT on newly built housing. He claimed this would be a tax on jobs, first time house buyers and would reduce the number of affordable homes. Typically the Conservatives have totally misrepresented the Liberal Democrat policy.

It is true that there is a policy to levy VAT on new homes, but this is to be balanced exactly by a reduction in VAT on repair and refurbishment costs to make the policy revenue neutral – so no additional tax will be collected.

Why is this good for Lymm? Because most of the expenditure on housing in Lymm is on repairs refurbishments and extensions; no significant new build is likely to be allowed in Lymm for the next 15 years so the emphasis will be on improving the existing stock. As the Liberal Democrat policy is likely to drop the VAT on such work from 17.5% to 5% or so, this will help Lymm’s householders, or their landlords, to improve homes and make them more energy efficient.

At the moment some 250,000 homes around the country are empty. Providing a tax incentive to get these back into use is the most effective way of providing much more affordable housing. Also this is not a tax on jobs, because repair and refurbishment is much more labour intensive than new build. So switching resources to this will provide more jobs and raise skill levels.

Will new house buyers be badly disadvantaged? Not necessarily. Instead of keeping new house prices low builders and developers have squandered money on ‘incentives’ and ‘free’ gifts which lost their value as soon as a house was lived in. These overpriced new homes, that couldn’t hold their value in the first few years of ownership, and easy money, contributed to the banking and debt crisis. If VAT is charged it is hoped that more basic new homes which offer better value for money will be built and that part of the impact will be to reduce land prices.

For Lymm this VAT cut will be a very welcome bonus for everyone needing to repair, improve, refurbish or extend their home.

Tom Williams, a keen Labour and Nick Bent supporter, is very keen on Twitter and constantly takes me to task over what he considers to be the ‘dodgy’ Liberal Democrat squeeze message in our literature.

David Mowat, the Conservative candidate for Warrington South uses an equally ‘dodgy’ squeeze bar chart based on voting in the last General Election to dismiss Liberal Democrat chances in Warrington South.

Our aspiration to have Jo Crotty elected to represent Warrington South in Parliament is based on our strength on Warrington Borough Council.

A UKIP supporter leaving a message on UK Polling Report has counted up the party votes in local elections in Warrington South in 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008:

“I suspect they have a much bigger Lib Dem local vote at the expense of both main parties General Election vote”

Your suspicions are correct:

2008 (added to original Polling Report figures)

LD    13608 47.6%
Con     8544 29.9%
Lab     5782 20.2%
Oth       664 2.3%

2007

LD    14292 52.5 %
Con     6229 22.9 %
Lab     6035 22.2 %
Oth        654   2.4 %

2006

LD   12107 50.0 %
Con    5882 24.3 %
Lab     5577 23.0 %
Oth       663   2.7 %

Which all looks very impressive but isn’t all that different to the result in the all up elections in 2004:

LD   17720 48.1 %
Con   8953 24.3 %
Lab    8775 23.8 %
Oth    1385   3.8 %

So Liberal Democrat aspirations in Warrington South are based on some of our strong local election performance being transferred to trust in the Liberal Democrats at the General Election. Our candidate has already represented a ward in the constituency very ably on Warrington Borough Council and will make an excellent MP. We are encouraged by Nick Clegg’s excellent performance in the national Leaders’ debate.

The Conservatives have flat lined in Warrington South for the last three elections. David Mowat’s aspirations rest on a hope that a national lead in the polls, which appears to have evaporated in the last few days, will translate into a better performance in Warrington South than in the last three General Elections when the Conservatives have consistently failed to achieve a third of the vote.

Nick Bent hopes that the haemorrhage of Labour votes to the Liberal Democrats in Warrington South slows down. He has a hard job, as the incumbent MP, Helen Southworth has given up on a seat she held with little enthusiasm and the local party have been behaving as though it was a lost cause for a while now. He is also hampered by a lack of resources or adequate support from the national and local parties. He is working very hard to make the seat his own by being enormously energetic and enthusiastic since he was adopted in January.

So what should voters do in Warrington South? Make up their own minds as they always do. Don’t vote to keep someone out, don’t vote for second best. If you like the Real Change the Liberal Democrats offer, if you like Nick Clegg, if you want fairer taxes, fairer schools, a greener economy and cleaner politics vote for Jo Crotty.

If you want a Liberal Democrat MP vote Liberal Democrat for Real Change.

In the last 24 hours the Facebook group We got RATM to #1 we can get the Lib Dems into office ! has gone viral and has over 60,000 fans. What is really impressive is the enthusiasm and the level of some of the debate.

I am impressed by the small number of very committed young Labour and Conservative supporters taking a very active part in the Warrington South campaign. I hope this Facebook group will encourage some equally enthusiastic young Lib Dem supporters to become inspired enough to get involved.

After so much reason to be disillusioned, and to feel that voting changes nothing, tens of thousands of young people are discovering their voice and realising that this is a pivotal election in which Real Change IS possible. They also realise that the decision the country takes at this election will affect their life chances more significantly than any other election of recent times.

I am delighted to see this happening and am grateful to Sarah and Katie for alerting me to the RATM phenomenon.

One of the great things about living in Lymm is the wealth of community activities, run by volunteers, covering many different aspects of village life. Without doubt everyone from mothers with new babies, toddlers, children, teenagers, adults with many special interests and the senior citizens of Lymm benefit enormously from this choice of activities and services. It is this range of activities that makes Lymm feel like a village rather than an anonymous dormitory suburb.

The big events like Carols around the Cross, the Duck Race, Dickensian Day and the May Queen, as well as the Lymm Summer Festival all attract thousands of people and are an important part of the Lymm Calendar.

However there is a problem. To continue successfully the committees that run these events have to renew themselves. When I started the Lymm Parish Council Community Fair we found that it was quite easy to get members of these committees to lay out their stalls in the Parish Hall. However, the aim of the Fairs was two-fold, to let Lymm residents see what is on offer and to find new volunteers. Sadly the event has largely failed on both counts. Very few people attending the fair wanted (or needed ?) a one-stop-shop to find out what is going in the Village, and only a small number came to volunteer their services.

This means that all the community activity in the village rests on the shoulders of a core group of volunteers probably counted in dozens rather than hundreds. It is usually relatively easy to find volunteers willing to provide the core activity, to work with youngsters or to put on events. What is much harder is finding those who will deal with the finances and bureaucracy associated with any activity that needs to be accountable to the public, and those with the practical skills to look after the infrastructure, buildings, vehicles sound equipment or permanent installations.

Inevitably volunteer fatigue sets in. Pressures of work, family life, moving out of the village or just exhaustion set in. Replacing volunteers, particularly for the back-room tasks isn’t easy.

As public funding has dwindled, a situation that can only become much worse over the coming decade, community groups find themselves constantly competing for grants and funds. This can set different activities in different locations against each other rather than encouraging cooperation. That adds another pressure that can simply put volunteers off. All these problems were very well summarised in letters to the Guardian after the Conservative “Big Society” policy was announced.

In a time of scarce resources it is important for community groups to work together. I very much hope that what started as the Community Fair can develop into a more permanent forum for volunteers in Lymm. In the near future it is going to be very important for community organisations to pull together rather than pull apart. Such a forum may help groups to be realistic about the human and financial resources available and the real needs of the village.

After a two year process, led largely by tenants of Golden Gates Housing, the Council’s Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMO) has been given the go-ahead to become an independent Housing Trust.Tenants had the final say in a ballot of all tenants. The result was an overwhelming YES vote in support of the transfer of the Council’s housing stock to the new independent trust. The result is the third strongest vote ever by tenants for large scale voluntary transfer of stock: 

Category                                                       Number         %

Total electorate-tenants eligible                  9845

Total votes cast                                             6215

Less spoiled/invalid votes                           15

Total valid votes cast                                    6200               63.13

Voting YES                                                    5696               91.9

Voting  No                                                      504                 8.1

Voting YES as % total electorate                                       57.9

Yes/no ratio of votes                                                            11.3 to 1

The significance of this result is that Golden Gates Housing Trust (GGHT) will be free to raise its own finance in order to invest £105 million in Warrington’s housing stock over the next 5 years. Even in these difficult times banks are very keen to help Housing Associations by lending them money on good terms. This is because well run Housing Associations are a very safe bet and have plenty of assets against which they can borrow.

The other big advantage for tenants is that they will no longer be paying 10% of their rent to other parts of the country and will not be dependent on public borrowing to have their houses improved. They can look forward to much improved homes and neighbourhoods over the next 5 years, double glazing, showers, energy saving measures, better fencing and environmental improvements have all been promised.Those living in areas where the Council used to own property will see the difference between Council homes, owner occupied homes and other rented homes will decrease.

We will begin to see the end of the “Council Estate” as a distinctively different housing area and it will become increasingly difficult to identify affordable housing as any different from other homes. Housing will be available in all areas to meet the needs and aspirations of those who need to live in that area.

Having been the responsible Executive Board member, I have seen the process leading to the ballot through from the start. I am particularly grateful to the Tenants, the Council’s adviser, Gerald Davies and the professionals who have guided this process. I am also grateful to the whole Council because the decision to go to ballot was backed unanimously by all parties on the Council and that has contributed to this successful outcome.

There is a lot of work ahead, but Golden Gates Tenants can expect to see improvements coming steadily over the next five years. While the Golden Gates Housing Trust keeps the promises to its tenants, that will free the Council up to continue delivering housing at all levels of affordability for those wanting to live and work in Warrington. I am proud of our excellent housing record, but promise that the Council will not relax in delivering our vision for housing in Warrington.

Conservative Party Poster

Source

 I warned in a post back in January that I expected the Tories to do their best to mislead the electorate about the responsibility for the National Debt. But even I didn’t expect it to be so blatant, so unfair and potentially so damaging.

The latest version of the independent Office for National Statistics graph, which shows the National Debt as a proportion of Gross Domestic Product shows where the Tory figure comes from. Having inherited a debt which was about 42.5% of what the country produces in a year, Gordon Brown used a combination of debt repayments and growth in the economy to drive that figure down to 30%. He then went on the alleged “spending spree” that George Osborne accuses him of.

The massive investment in schools, hospitals, universities and transport infrastructure drove debt up to about 36% of GDP, hardly wild irresponsibility and well below the 42.5% he inherited (although much of the real spending has been hidden as future commitments to pay for PFI contracts, but that is another story).

Then the roof fell in; the roof of deregulated irresponsible banks, lending to wildly overoptimistic consumers and speculating recklessly with customers’ money. Let’s not forget it was the Tories who championed the Big Bang, our overdependence on financial services and an inadequate system for “light touch” regulation of the Banks. If Gordon Brown was guilty of anything it was his naivety in not reining back this golden goose that appeared to be driving the economy.

Governments all around the world had no option but not to allow the cash points to run dry and citizen’s savings to disappear as the banking system collapsed. The only solution was to borrow unprecedented amounts of money to prop up the banking system. the Tories will tell you that Gordon Brown was uniquely irresponsible and bad at rescuing the banks and managing the economy. Labour will tell you that he was a world leader and the architect of the solution adopted throughout the G20.

Which is true? Probably neither, but that is the YahBoo politics the ping pong parties will be throwing at an electorate, they believe to be gullible, over the next five weeks.

The Liberal Democrats do not treat the electorate with such disdain, we know the tuth lies somewhere between the two equally ludicrous assertions from the two ends of the Labservative party. Vince Cable has earned deserved praise for both anticipating a crisis and for having a credible solution. He, and the Liberal Democrats deserve a large say in how we get the country out of this mess.

Last Thursday Warrington Friends of the Earth hosted a “Question Time” style debate which kicked off the local General Election campaign. The event was skilfully chaired by Gareth Dunning of the Warrington Guardian. It attracted a lively audience, including councillors from all three parties and packed out the Friends Meeting House. It was particularly nice to see so many school and college students there showing both a political and an environmental awareness. Warrington’s recently elected member of the Youth Parliament, Melissa Hannon, made a good statement to get the event started.

The panel included David Mowat, Conservative; Nick Bent, Labour; Dr Jo Crotty, Liberal Democrat and Dave Coleman a Friends of the Earth spokesman. Unfortunately the Green Party were unable to take part.

All the panel members were given an opportunity to make an opening statement. These were, on the whole, non-partisan, setting a dignified and serious tone for the evening. All three political panel members stated their strongly held green views.

It was reassuring to find that David Mowat does not the share the climate change denying tendencies of some more extreme members of his party. He was modest about his environmental expertise, but gave clear answers most of the time. If he didn’t know an answer he said so, but he had a clear grasp of his party’s policies. His manner was slightly disengaged except when subject to a partisan attack, which sounded personal, from Nick Bent

Boyish and bright Nick Bent was disappointing. He was the only one of the candidates to stray from environmental issues onto partisan attacks, which didn’t go down well with the audience. At every opportunity he raised the Omega Incinerator scare story, which has no basis in fact, or claimed to have single-handedly campaigned to save two threatened re-cycling sites from the budget cuts. It was, in fact the public consultation that raised concern from established Warrington citizens which led to the budget being amended to keep these sites; not Bent’s bandwagon jumping. For an experienced lobbyist Bent was surprisingly poor at debate.

Jo Crotty was at an advantage because she is an environmental economist by training and profession. However she gave clear and understandable answers and engaged fully in the debate. Jo surprised some members of her own party by making clear her support for the local nuclear industry, in opposition to national LibDem policy. However, her views are in line with a North West LibDem motion passed at the Regional Conference in 2008. Jo also expressed concern about the amount the Council intends to spend on Waste management consultancy to explore energy from waste strategies over the next seven years.

The event was greatly assisted by the presence of Dave Coleman, an expert adviser to Friends of the Earth, on the panel. Without being patronising he was able to explain in plain English why many environmental choices are not as simple as they may at first seem. The event avoided emotional reactions to the trigger words “nuclear” and “incinerator” which some participants wanted to use as scare stories. There are committed members of Friends of the Earth who will not tolerate either of those technologies under any circumstances; however most of the discussion was far more balanced.

Richard Pearce from Low Carbon Lymm contributed a helpful brief review of the range of industrial scale recycling and energy recovery plants that are being built in the region and may potentially be used to process some of Warrington’s waste.

The evening ended with universal acclaim for the organisers for putting on such an informative event, for Gareth Dunning’s skilful chairmanship and to the candidates, all of whom made a valuable contribution to the meeting. It is a shame that there will not be many opportunities to see our parliamentary candidates for Warrington South in open debate during the campaign.
 

Available from Amazon

So why may this book be of interest to voters in Warrington South? Probably because they are unhappy about their taxes being used to provide expensive consultants with lavish lifestyles that allow them to become full time politicians to fight the election.

Of the three candidates in this election two have benefited from the public sector consultancy gravy train. David Mowat earned enough at Accenture to retire early, devote his time to charity and to funding himself to fight a target Parliamentary seat.

Brainy Nick Bent has spent his entire career working in the even more abstract world of think tanks, spin doctoring and political advising. He is a proud member of GMB (originally the General Municipal and Boilermakers union) which no doubt now has a special branch for spin-doctors, advisers and allied workers and has been campaigning full time since his adoption.

Dr Jo Crotty, no less brainy than the other two, at least has a real job, teaching real students in a university and has a formidable research record in the economics of sustainability as well as fighting for the residents of the ward she represents on Warrington Borough Council.

Jo has been campaigning hard for Warrington South and representing her constituents in Bewsey alongside her university duties. She doesn’t have the luxury of Ashcroft or Union money that the other candidates are now bickering about.

Only Jo offers the opportunity to vote for Real Change. The Liberal Democrats are the only party that has consistently opposed the consultants’ gravy trains, the off balance sheet accounting of PFI, and the New Labour obsession with forcing the use of both.

So if you want an end to the ping pong politics, and they really do pong, of the two old parties that have colluded in plundering the public sector, vote Jo, vote Liberal Democrat.