David Walker

Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Danny Alexander MP, writes:
“Over 20 million working people will be better off next year after Liberal Democrats in the Coalition government delivered the biggest ever increase in the income tax personal allowance in the Budget.
“The increase of £1,100 is worth £220 to 21 million working people – taking the total income tax cut for working people delivered over three years by the Coalition to nearly £550 a year. Two million people will pay no income tax at all. By going ‘further and faster’ as Nick Clegg promised, we getting real help to millions of hard-pressed people at a time when they need it most.
“The £14bn tax cut means that the government is in ‘touching distance’ of delivering the most important promise we Liberal Democrats made in the 2010 General Election manifesto – that no one should have to pay any income tax until they earn more than £10,000. “With the allowance rising to an historic high of £9,205 next April, our aim will be to deliver the final step at the next budget – so that people get the full benefit over a year before the 2015 General Election.
“This big tax cut for working people is paid for in part by a significant increase in the tax paid by the wealthiest. As part of the Coalition budget deal, we agreed to reduce the top rate of tax to 45p – but only after securing a series of new taxes on the wealthy that pay for it five times over. “Labour’s 50p rate turned out not to work effectively. By introducing taxes that do work, like a tycoon tax, raising stamp duty, blocking stamp duty avoidance, and getting non-resident companies to pay Capital Gains Tax on their residential property, we have secured real progress on the taxation of wealth. This is a Budget for the many, not the few.
“All of this has been done while sticking to our tough but necessary plan to deal with this country’s financial problems. Britain can’t afford unfunded giveaways – unlike the last Labour government, we have made sure everything is paid for.
“The Budget shows real progress on our commitments to infrastructure – on roads, railways, and renewable energy. Tougher green taxes on company cars will help cut emissions as well as raising money.
“The Budget delivers other long fought for Liberal Democrat ideas. The government is now committed to delivering the ‘single tier pension’ – Steve Webb’s plan for a Citizen’s Pension that will mean a basic pension above the means test of around £140 per week.
“Specific measures to support key industrial sectors like creative industries, technology investment, aerospace and university spin out, as well as further Business Tax simplification means that we have delivered a Budget for growth as well as fairness.
“The negotiations on this Budget were friendly but hard fought. But Liberal Democrats should be proud of what we have achieved – not for ourselves, but for the millions of people who voted for us because they saw a party willing to stand up for the squeezed middle. Those people can see the difference we are making in government for them – and that gives us a very strong message for the elections in May and beyond.”

I was always amazed that someone who was so vitriolically opposed to the European Union should spend so much of his career as a member of the European Parliament.

Now Roger Helmer has decided that the Coalition is not sufficiently negative about the EU.

The EU is working to resolve a whole range of problems ranging from the after effects of a surfeit of borrowing to conditions for the accession of Croatia.

Roger does not want to be part of this and has decided to join UKIP, many of whose contributions to debate in the European Parliament have been disgracefully rude and irrelevant and have brought down the reputation of the UK.

No doubt he will continue to contribute very little to the good work of the EU, but spend most of his effort speaking against it. There is no good reason why he should continue to take a salary and expenses from the EU. He should  resign and allow the possibility of his seat being taken by someone who is keen to  promote the good work of the EU.

On Saturday I attended the East Midlands Regional Conference of Liberal Democrats.

It was a super meeting.

We were delighted to welcome new Councillors who had just been elected in a by election win with a 30% swing to the Lib Dems.

Norman Lamb spoke to us very well about the problems of the huge defecit that had been built up under the Labour Government and the work of the coalition governement in bringing this down. He gave us an insight of his work on behalf of the UK in the EU and the important policy decisions that we are involved in.

We discussed four interesting policy issues which we might put forward to National Conference (Lib Dems do not decide on policy on the sofa). I spoke against a proposal that all food should be labelled with a certificate that it did not involve child labour etc. We get a lot of our supplies from Ian in Elf foods and from the market in Loughborough. Tesco could cope with further regulations, but local traders could not and we voted against this proposal.

Bill Newton Dun was at the meeting (MEP for the East Midlands) and spoke about a number of initiatives in the EU with which he is involved.

It was a really good day.

There were only three of us from Loughborough. If you would like to be involved in the next meeting do email me and we can organise lifts etc.

When I heard that the govenrment was proposing to reintroduce weekly bin collections, and had offerd £250M support for those councils that moved in that direction, my initial reaction was one of “don’t be ridiculous”.

Charnwood has just been through a very successful re-negotiation of the contract for refuse collection and has made  large part of the cost reductions required by government by this new contract. I was very supportive (as a Councillor) of the good work that had been done by Cabinet members and Officers to negotiate this contract. It seems to be working well.

One thing did worry me though; residents had frequently complained about the smell of rotting food towards the end of the two week collection period in the main bin. I was also aware that everything in that bin became unreclaimable because it was contaminated by rotting food waste.

I argued at the time that we were debating the contract, and had argued before that, that we needed to have a collection for food waste, but was told that this would cost £400,000 a year and could not be afforeded.

The food waste that goes into the black bin molders and smells, and when it is dumped in landfill rots and gives off methane, which is a more potent cause of global warming than CO2.

East Midlands Region Spring Conference

Saturday 18^th February 2012 – 10.00am to 4.30pm

Abington High School, Station Road, Wigston Magna, LE18 2DU

The programme will include:

Policy debates

A Special General meeting to approve the rewritten regional constitution

Address by Norman Lamb MP (NE Norfolk) – Assisstant Whip and personal advisor to Rt Hon NIck Clegg MP – Deputy Prime Minister

Lunch - Hosted by Bill Newton Dunn, MEP

What do we want at future conference?

Workshops

Connect – How to get it & how to use it – Austin Rathe

Oskar – Online Campaign tools – How it can help you – Michael Mullaney

Diversity Matters – Vicky Booth, Diversity Officer, HQ

Q & A with Norman Lamb MP

How to Write a Press Release

Speaking to Voters

I will be going to this. I would be happy to give a lift. Get to know your Lib Dem camaigners!!

Developers and builders will seize any opportunity to buy beautiful countryside and put houses on it. The more beautiful the area the higher price that can be charged for the finished houses. Great gains for the developers and a benefit for the purchaser.

BUT the community as a whole loses the enjoyment of that countryside. It is difficult to determine landscape value, though it can be done. In the case of the proposal to build houses on land at the end of Bramcote Road there is absolutely no doubt that the value lost to the community would be far greater than the profit made by the developers. This is why we need planning legislation, a planning department and a committee of Councillors to determine if planning proposals are, on balance, to the benefit of the whole community. Without planning the whole countryside would be blighted by scattered houses, carefully selectiing the best view (until it was blocked by another house!). Our current planning system was developed in the late 1940s to stop the uncontrolled spread of towns (unsustainable urban expansion) and ribbon development where houses could be built along roads without having to bear the cost of roads and sewers, or supplies or water, gas and electricity because they were already there.

The proposed development at the end of Bramcote road contravenes nearly all the established planning guidelines, but most importantly it threatens the integrity of the countryside beyond the edge of the built up area of Outwoods Ward.

I append below the letter of objection that I submitted, which is now, with many others, on the planning web site. I trust that the Councillors on the Plans Committee will read all these submissions and realise that the strenght of public opinion is a factor that they cannot ignore when they come to decide on this proposal.

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David Walker
337 Beacon Road
Loughborough
Le11 2RA
01509 215658

Charnwood Borough Council
Development Management
Southfield Road
Loughborough
LE11 2TN

FAO Mr P Blitz

OBJECTION to Application No. P/11/2842/2
Land South of Bramcote Road Loughborough Leics

31 January 2012
Dear  Peter Blitz ,
I am writing to  register an objection to the above planning application.??The proposal fails in many respects: outside the limits to development, flood risk, environmental impact, traffic problems to name but a few. It would be superfluous to list all the elements of the saved local policies which could be used to argue against this proposal.
Over riding all of these are the fact that the open land between the built up area and the Outwoods  is a fundamental element of the beauty of the this area. It is the best area of Loughborough and the town would be enormously diminished if house building was allowed here
Secondly and closely related, is the fact that there was an appeal against a planning refusal for a very similar proposal some ten years ago. The Inspector rejected the appeal, and it is now established practice that once an Inspector has ruled against an application, it is almost certain that the inspectorate would rule agains any similar appeal. Therefore Councillors can be confident that if there is an appeal against refusal the inspector will almost certainly reject it.
I am aware that planning policy is influenced by concepts of housing shortage and the fact that Charnwood is not meeting its target for house building. However this is likely to be irrelevant in the light of the forthcoming Local Development Framework which will designate areas for substantial additional housing, and thus make the need to develop this area of land redundant.
There are hundreds of people who enjoy the open country leading up to the Outwoods, it would be an act of gross landscape destruction to allow any part of it to be built on. There are no reasonable arguments for making a recommendation for the grant of planning permission for this application and I trust that you will not do so.

Yours Sincerely,

On 3rd November Liberal Democrat candidate Carolyn Caddick won a Council seat from Lbour in Inversess. On 10th November Liberal Democrat candidate Cathy French won a seat from teh Conservatives in Norwich.

Since the summer, Liberal Democrats have made more gains that any of the other parties.

There is a growing realisation that the Coalition is a much better government than the Conservatives would have been if they they had won the last election outright.

There is also a growing realisation that Liberal Democrats make a significant contribution in Local Government, driven by the three key principles of the party: Efficiency, Equality and Environment.

I remember driving to work in the dark during the experiment of GMT +1 during the winters of 1967 to 71. But I also remember the benefits of coming home in the light and having more time for sport and recreation at weekend evenings. The experiment saved lives on the roads, saved energy and made me and many think that this was a good policy which should be made permanent.

There is now a draft bill, going through Parliament for a renewed trial period to ensure that the benefits are still there. Excellent! Now David Cameron has said that he will allow the Scottish Parliament to veto it. What a wimpish response!

Time and again the potential benefits of a change have been denied to us by opposition from the Scots.

The arguments are overwhelming and can be read in full at:

http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN0379

The three most significant benefits are:

Deaths of Children:

At least 80 deaths (predominantly of children coming home from school in the dark when they and drivers are tired) would be saved and many more injuries in road accidents. I would have thought that this would be a good enough argument on its own. In Edinburgh sunset on Dec 10th is at 3.59 and would change to 4.59, in Leicester it would be 11 minutes later. This means that children leaving school at 4.00 pm would get most of the way home in the light, in Scotland as well as locally.

Tourism:

An extra hour of accessible daylight could add £3 billion a year to an industry worth £76 billion in 2004

Energy:

There would be a saving of 6GWh of electricity per winter day;  and at least 500,000 million tonnes of carbon dioxide saved each year??.

The research indicates a whole range of further benefits.

I hope that the government will allow a free vote on this issue, and that members will read the report and vote for the bill.

It is unhelpful of the Daily Mail to say we would then be on Berlin Time, just what devious mind thinks this would be the right way to influence public opinion. It would also be the same as Paris time, of Copenhagen time etc, and we would not have to change our watches when going on holiday on the Continent.

Interestingly Russia has just decided to abandon the summer/winter shifting of the clocks. Having just spent an hour changing every clock and timer I feel that Putin might have got just one thing right.

Some of the time that I would have been spending in Council Committees has been redirected. I remain active in the Ward and the Division and continue to respond to requests for any problems relating to local issues. However  I have been to Corwall, Somerset, Belgium, France and Ireland since the May elections, and have taken on much more work with voluntary organisations.

Yesterday I came back from  a fascinating visit to Ireland which included a visit to the European Head Office of Google, an amazing organisation which is located in the centre of Dublin and employing over three thousand staff  in an environment that is quite unlike any other that I have seen, with areas to relax and play as well as spaces for meetings and discussions.

Instead of the usual Ryanair jet flight we went by train and boat, which was cheaper than Ryanair (£32 and no extras) and much more interesting.

I was back in time for the AGM of the Garendon Park Countryside Protection Group. The meeting was very well attended and postive in their approach of challenging  the assumption that part of the solution to the “housing crisis” is to designate this last area of green space between Loughborought and Shepshed as building land.

On the BBC website this morning I read:

Steve Turner, a spokesman for the Home Builders Federation, says the planning system has been an obstacle for growth for years. “For decades the planning system has not been delivering enough land to meet the housing needs of our population,”

This really annoys me. I have served on the Planning Committee, and know that this is not the problem. So many applications to build on agricultural land have been granted that it would take nearly five years to fill it. But builders are not building because they claim that they cannot sell the houses, because people can’t get mortgages.

The problem is that house prices are far too high, and that there are not enough houses to rent. The solutions are political and economic, not in allocating even more greenfield land to the housebuilders.

This blog was called my Councillor.

Sadly I am no longer your Councillor, but will remain very active in the Ward and the Division, offering a sensible alternative to Labour and Conservative policies and decisions, and working with local people.

I will keep up with the committees and their decisions and offer my views, and hope to get responses from those who follow this blog.

I am now your Lib Dem Campaigner, and campaigning for sensible policies in Outwoods Ward, Loughborough SouthWest, Loughborough, Charnwood, Leicestershire, the UK and Europe.