Interesting Elections 1: Warboys and Upwood

In a series of about the Cambridgeshire County Elections I thought I would look at coming and goings at some of the more interesting election battles. Warboys and Upwood is an interesting battle. This is a Conservative seat.

At the 2009 County Council elections the results was the following:

Warboys and Upwood electoral division
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Victor Lucas	1,408	49.8	−5.5
	UKIP	Robert Brown	803	28.4	N/A
	Liberal Democrat	Robert Johnson	504	17.8	−14.6
	Labour	Margaret Cochrane	98	3.5	−8.8
Rejected ballots			10	0.4
Turnout			2,826	39.0
	Conservative hold		Swing

A good Conservative hold with UKIP second.

Victor Lucas having stood down there is now a vacancy which has been taken up by Cllr Jason Ablewhite who is standing as the Conservative candidate. The candidates for May 2013 are:

Name of Candidate      Home Address
The Conservative Party Candidate
ABLEWHITE Jason    Churchill House, 3 Pettis Rd, St Ives, PE27 6SR
Labour Party Candidate
GODDARD Kevin Roy 20 Worthington Close, Stilton, Peterborough, PE7 3XF
UK Independence Party (UKIP)
TEW Michael Russell     8 High Meadow, Bury, Hunts, PE26 2LD
Liberal Democrat
WILLS Christine Susan   28 The Paddock, Somersham, PE28 3JU

The only candidate to live in the division is Mike Tew standing for UKIP. All the other candidates live outside the division. What makes this an interesting seat is Cllr Ablewhite is currently Leader of Huntingdonshire District Council and is also a Town Councillor on St Ives Town Council. As leader, Cllr Ablewhite, upped Council Tax for HDC for 3.7% this year and upped the Council Tax last year.

The problem for Cllr Ablewhite is he needs to win and needs to win well to be able to stand up and say the electorate are with me on upping Council Tax. If Cllr Ablewhite loses then he will have a far tougher time when he proposes more increases in the years to come as this strategy would have been thrown out by the electorate.

What I do find a bit disconcerting is Cllr Ablewhite's address. Churchill House? Sounds as though he is wrapping himself in the Union Flag to fend off his tax rises. If his house is named after Winston Churchill and not disgraced Ken Churchill (standing as an Independent in St Neots) Cllr Abelwhite should take note of a quote from Winston:

“I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.”

Reason 3 not to vote Conervative: Less women

The Cambridgeshire Conservatives are looking to make being a County Councillor more male dominated.

Of the 9 Conservative women elected in 2009 5 are re-standing. They are:

Gail Kenney – Sawston
Mandy Smith – Papworth
Laine Kadic - Huntingdon
Samantha Hoy – Wisbech North
Viv McGuire – Sawtry and Ellington

4 are not re-standing and are being replaced by men. They are:
Shona Johnstone – Willingham. Replaced by Ray Manning
Linda Oliver – Bassingbourn. Replaced by Adrian Dent
Catherine Hutton - Eaton Socon and Eynesbury. Replaced by Roger Harrison
Jill Tuck – Waldersley. Replaced by Will Sutton

There is one women replacing a man. Julie Wisson is taking over from Richard West in Buckden and The Offords.

Even if the Conservatives are re-elected in the same seats the Conservatives will have 3 less women.

The other women standing are divided into no hopers and might win.
The six no hopers are:
Anette Karimi - King's Hedges
Sheila Lawlor – Market
Linda Yeatman - Petersfield
Jane King – Brampton and Kimbolton
Madeleine Jackson – Ramsey
Alison Paula Elcox – Gamlingay
The two might wins are:
Anna Bailey – Ely South and West
Lynda Harford – Cottenham
At best the Conservatives maybe one councillor down if they make advances. If the Conservatives have problems they will lose women Councillors hand over fist.

Reason 3 not to vote Conservative less women as Conservative Councillors.

The first reason on not to vote Labour

Apart from ####ing up the economy and the country besides, the Labour Party is back to its old ways of whinging about cuts Labour caused and the Coalition has to implement. In the Labour County manifesto for Cambridgeshire it is all about whinging and nothing on how their whinges would be paid for.

Labour is all about whinging and nothing about how to pay for their whinges. Typical Labour. Let the country down and still expect people to fall for the old trick of massive spending without credible ways to pay for this spending.

People who vote Labour are voting to kick their fellow citizens in the teeth and are rewarding failure. That is the selfish amongst us.

Maggie Thatcher

I met Maggie Thatcher once, though I saw her a few times on stage. To me Maggie was the 1970's and 1980's. A time of much needed change. Maggie changed Britain from a country destined for a left wing slow death by moving the centre of British politics to the right. Whilst there has been some movement in the Centre of British politics it is the left that moved to the right rather than the right moving to the left.

To me, Maggie Thatcher was the greatest leader the British had in my lifetime. A conviction politician to the last. Those who came after Maggie just pale into insignificance. An icon of hate for the left. Living diety to the right.

Gone but not forgotten.

Reason 2 not to vote Conservative: 8.3% increase in the Cambs Fire Authority

What has Cambs Fire Authority (CFA) got to do with the County Council elections? The CFA is an appointed authority by Peterborough City Council and Cambridgeshire County Council. PCC appoints 4 members (3 Conservatives - 1 Labour) and CCC appoints 13 members (8 Conservatives, 4 Liberal Democrats and 1 Labour).

Out of 17 members the Conservatives hold 11 seats, Liberal Democrats 4 seats and Labour 2 seats. The Conservatives have a majority of 5 over the other two parties.

The 8.3% increase is therefore a Conservative increase.

The main reason given for this increase was:

The Director of Resources highlighted the importance of the increase in order to safeguard beyond 2014/15 and build some flexibility in the base for the long-term future.

Which means this has nothing to do with the Fire Authority preserving services but everything to do with just increasing Council Tax. Far easier when you are appointed rather than elected to this Authority.

The Chairman (Fred Brown - Conservative) informed the Authority that he had asked the Fire Minister (Brandon Lewis - Conservative - Great Yarmouth) whether this increase could be deferred to another point in time and had been advised that the Authority should take this one year opportunity to build its base.

Eric Pickles (Communities Secretary - Conservative) called on local authorities to freeze council tax whilst an underling is informing local authorities to up their council tax. The Conservatives said any increase over 2% needed to be endorsed by a referendum. Of course this has been watered down by the Conservatives with increases under £5 now not needing a referendum.

The referendum idea was a good idea. The only problem is the councils, and mainly Conservative run Councils, are avoiding this Conservative policy like the plague because they don't want to ask the people who pay just incase we all say NO!

The CFA has upped their portion by 8.3% with the backing of Government which also informs the people it wants the Local Authorities to freeze council tax. Reason 2 not to vote Conservative is an 8.3% increase by the Conservatives.

Reason 1 not to vote Conservative: Council Tax increases!

Despite the Government putting some money towards a Council Tax Freeze, Conservative run Local Authorities in Cambridgeshire have gone ahead with Council Tax rises this financial year. A majority did last year!

The following rises went through:

Cambs Council Council (Conservative run) 2% rise
Police (Conservative run) 2% rise
Fire (Conservative run) 8.3% rise

South Cambs DC (Conservative run) 4.3% rise
Fenland DC (Conservative run) 1.7% rise
East Cambs 2%
Huntingdonshire DC (Conservative run) 3.7% rise

Just goes to show that Conservative Councils will tax when they want too.

I used to vote Tory...

....and now I don't. For decades I voted Conservative from local elections through to General and European Elections. In the last 5 years my faith in the Conservative Party has gone down. Somewhat bruised by the expenses scandal and the idiots amongst the Conservative MPs has really shaken my belief.

I feel David Cameron is the best leader for the Conservative Party. I see no others that could better him. What seems to be happening is the right of the party are kicking away supports so they can blame him for the eventual loss at the next General Election.

The problem is the Conservative Party. It is dying on its feet and needed to get through changes in parliamentary boundaries to get within a margin of able to win an election. To do so they would have had to change the House of Lords into an elected Upper House. Good, nothing wrong in that.

Locally their has been problems. My Conservative run local authorities in Cambridgeshire have now gotten into the habit of upping Council Tax. They can't use the bogey-man of other parties upping Council Tax when many have upped CT themselves.

What of other political parties? Labour simply mad idiots who ****ed this country. Not a chance. Liberal Democrats who are looking more reasonable but are far too left for me. UKIP are a bunch of idiots who are far too right wing for me.

Who to vote for? I don't know and I'm using this blog to explore which party I should vote for in the future