Thank you so much to all of you supported us during the election campaign in 2005, especially our dedicated team of deliverers and canvassers, not to mention the County Council candidates who gave up their free time in the name of local democracy.
According to Henry Bolton, the Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Runnymede & Weybridge, there is a real need to introduce a pension that ends means testing for the oldest pensioners and removes discrimination against women. He says, "Women should be entitled to a pension in their own right. The LibDems would address this immediately once in power."
A Unite/Mori student survey carried out in January 2004 on voting intentions gives the Lib Dems a leading share of 34%, with Labour on 28% and the Tories third on 19%. Students will have a major impact in 2005, as the elections are expected during the university year, on May 5, unlike in 2001 when the elections fell during the holiday period.
Commenting on the launch of an online map to tell homeowners about flooding risks in England and Wales, Norman Baker MP, Liberal Democrat Shadow Environment Secretary, said:
Liberal Democrat Leader Charles Kennedy today launched the Liberal Democrat Pre-manifesto - the first important stage in the manifesto process, which will take the Party into the General Election.
Under new Liberal Democrat proposals police chiefs would sign contracts with local communities setting out how many officers they would deploy. The "minimum policing guarantees" would set funding levels for local police for a rolling three-year period. The guarantees are part of the party's new plans to tackle crime. The plans include using money earmarked for the government's ID card plan to hire an extra 10,000 front line police and 20,000 community support officers.
The European Court of Justice in Luxembourg has ruled that a challenge to secret EU laws should succeed. It said that bans on taking prohibited item like weapons and liquids on planes can have no legal force if they are not published.
The European Parliament's Industry, Research and Energy committee meeting in Strasbourg has voted in favour of further reductions in mobile-phone roaming charges. The report on the "Roaming 2" regulation, drafted by ALDE (Lib Dem) MEP Adina-Ioana Valean from Romania extends the regulation for voice roaming and widens its scope to include roaming SMS text and data services, as well as including more transparency measures.
Surrey County Council has been downgraded from 3 stars to 1 by the Audit Commission, the Government body that assesses the performance of local authorities. They have concluded from the most recent inspections carried out last year that Surrey services are performing inadequately and failing its most vulnerable residents.
The Liberal Democrats have opposed Surrey County Council's budget as "fundamentally flawed". Surrey council tax payers will continue to receive poor services over the next year, after the ruling Conservative administration adopted a budget that cuts bus services, pot hole repairs, gritting and road gully cleaning.
Arising from a challenge by Capel Parish Council to the Surrey Waste Plan, a High Court judge has stated that he will quash SCC's recent planning permission for the Capel Incinerator. A similar thing happened to the previous planning consent given in 2001, though that was on a challenge by the Capel Action Group to the SCC officers' report to the Planning & Regulatory Committee.
Speaking during the debate at this week's meeting of Surrey County Council, Lib Dem opposition leader Hazel Watson said that the Conservative administration must stop wasting council taxpayers' money.
