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.
Willie Rennie's election as the new MP for Dunfermline and West Fife, home of chancellor Gordon Brown, takes the total of Liberal Democrat in the House of Commons to 63. His by-election victory not only saw a 16% swing from New Labour to the Liberal Democrats, it also saw David Cameron's Conservatives retain fourth place with a swing of 9% from the Conservatives to the Liberal Democrats.
Surrey County Council's Tory budget brought bad news for parents and youngsters in Sixth Forms and Colleges.
At the County Council meeting today, the Liberal Democrats on Surrey County Council opposed the 2006/07 budget proposed by the Conservative administration.
After an initial period of close secrecy, the names of 18 youth centres in Surrey planned for closure following the Tories' BDR review have been released. This had earlier been presented as 15 closures, apparently because 3 new facilities are also planned. Councillors representing the divisions affected by the closures have been offered a meeting where the reasons behind these decisions will be explained. Meanwhile the names of the 18 youth facilities at risk are:
The issue of waste remains high on the agenda in Surrey, with not one but two draft waste plans up for discussion. The first, which ended its 6 week period of public consultation in December 2005, comes from the position of Surrey County Council (SCC) as the Waste Planning Authority (WPA) and is called "The Surrey Waste Plan - The Preferred Plan". This basically sets out the County's overall strategy of where and how waste should be handled, giving site specific details. The Liberal Democrats at County Hall criticised this plan as being fundamentally flawed, back in September, because it was predicated on incineration and highlighted a preferred site, Capel. We are still awaiting the results of the public consultation.
Surrey County Council has outsourced its highways maintenance to two contractors, one for the west and one for the east. Since its start 3 years ago the management of this Tory-inspired arrangement has been heavily criticised, with work not being done on time or to budget. Lib Dems are seeking to ensure that these issues are addressed by beefing up the management of the contract and ensuring that its performance indicator criteria deliver on-time and on-budget results. We are very concerned that yet another Tory reorganisation of the transportation service (proposed in the Business Delivery Review) will damage the county's ability to manage the contractors. Also proposed in the BDR is a cut in the maintenance budget to spend more on capital. In the short term (5 years) that will mean worse roads in Surrey!
