Author: Martin

A 250-word article for the Petersfield Post, Clanfield Post, Horndean Post and Bordon Post:

Like many, I’ve been surprised at how shambolic the Conservative Party’s national campaign has been. We supposedly have a ‘strong and stable’ Prime Minister, but frankly she’s been all over the place.

First, we had the shambles of the ‘dementia tax’: poorly thought through and an embarrassing flip-flip when it came to light.

We’ve had ever more evidence at the damage that Conservative cuts are doing to vital public services like the police, health and education.

And we’ve had platitudes and no detail on what the Conservatives want to do with the Brexit negotiations – and what they intend to do to offset the massive risks that the Prime Minister herself admits exist.

We need a change.

As your MP, I won’t only vote for the party line, I’ll put Meon Valley first:

• working to get proper funding for our health and social care services,
• making sure none of our schools lose funding – and stopping any of them being downgraded to secondary modern status as the Conservatives propose
• working to block any Brexit deal that doesn’t protect local jobs, local farmers and local businesses – doesn’t maintain full shared security cooperation – and doesn’t have full membership of the single market. I will also seek to make sure that the British people have a final say on any Brexit deal reached.

Even if the Conservatives win nationally, they still need a strong opposition. Please use your vote to back me and ensure that Meon Valley’s best interests are fully represented in Westminster.

A 250-word article for the Petersfield Post, Clanfield Post, Horndean Post and Bordon Post answering the question ‘What action would you/your party propose to take to prevent more terror attacks like the one in Manchester from happening again?’:

The atrocity in Manchester was horrifying and very distressing. One of the few points of light has been the failure of ISIS’s strategy of using this kind of attack to polarise the community in Manchester and nationally: they’ve almost completely failed to do this. It has also been reassuring how quickly the security services seem to have wound up the network responsible for the attack – enabling the terror threat level to be reduced from critical to severe.

The critical question remaining is how it could have been prevented. People who knew Salman Abedi reported that he was a risk on several occasions but he still slipped through the net.

While we need to wait for the results of Police and MI5’s review of this failure, one reason for Liberal Democrat concern with the brutal Conservative cuts to policing budgets – including here in Hampshire – is that this kind of problem might emerge. That’s one reason our manifesto pledges to increase community policing by giving an additional £300m a year to local police forces.

We also need to continue to collaborate internationally in fighting terrorism. Theresa May’s plans for an ultra-hard Brexit must not be allowed to jeopardise this. Finally, we must also resist the temptation to use this to justify indiscriminate snooping powers or to weaken encryption. The priority must be strong community relations to identify people who are potential risks – and then focused efforts – via surveillance or, if necessary, through TPIMs to disrupt any potential attacks before they happen.