Paul Kennedy

LOCATION... Appleton, in the Cheshire Constituency of Warrington South.

SELF-DESCRIPTION... Born in Oxford in November 1956, (but almost Malta), have lived in Coventry, South Manchester, Chesterfield and for the last 19 years, Warrington has been the family home. Married to Sue with Sons of 9 and 15. Despite having a very good Grammar School education, my academic record was to say the least, not outstanding, and having been rejected for pilot training, quite sensibly on the part of the RAF in retrospect, I entered the world of business on leaving school, at the tender age of 18. Through a combination of guile, good fortune and maybe a little bit of hard work, I found myself relatively soon on the Board of a number of companies and in some cases even as the Managing Director. In 1995 after completing my work at what was South Wales Electricity Plc., I gave up the trappings (and income) of a senior management career to spend more time with my family and to become a full time mature student at the University of Manchester, graduating with a "First" in Business Management & IT. I still have some minor business interests and look after the accounts of a number of organisations. I have in the past, in a voluntary capacity, assisted the Board of a major national housing association, as well as being the Chairman of NHS Complaints Panels. Despite being traditionally a Conservative voter, in the 2005 General Election I stood as the Independent Candidate for Warrington South and appealed to 453, who can only be described as highly discerning voters! I was defeated, but not deflated and even managed a rather good losers speech at 02:30 a.m. It was however a professional campaign with a number of serious messages. I thoroughly enjoyed what was a vigorous campaign and learned a vast amount in the process, as well as becoming fitter with all of the walking involved. Realism, commonsense and the fact that the Conservative party didn't go into self destruct mode meant that I applied to be a member of  Warrington South Conservative Association, was accepted and then selected to fight my home Ward, and Lib Dem stronghold, of Appleton in the recent local elections, didn't get elected but managed to increase the share of the vote from 23% to 29%, so a start. Outside of business and now politics, I'm a great (well I like to think so) DIYer, which has included designing and overseeing the building of our family home, but in reality I will turn my hand to anything and even rebuilt an MGB many years ago. And finally, still believe that my best years lie ahead of me, even though there is no certainty as to what I will be doing.

POLITICAL BELIEFS... Probably best described, I think, as an economic and social conservative, so probably not much hope for me. Don't like debt and a strong believer in; the traditional family and many of our institutions (and am saddened to see how undermined they have become); community; personal responsibility; and last but certainly not least, national sovereignty. Dislike large Government, whether local, national or international, most forms of bureaucracy and complex management structures. Totally against regional assemblies and have yet to see the benefit for their citizens of  the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly. Believe in very simple taxation and genuine value for money public services run by professionals without the continuous interference of politicians. Am very concerned that our education system is not enabling our best academic brains to excel, whilst forcing those whose skills and interests lie elsewhere to follow an academic education. Interestingly and maybe surprisingly for a conservative, I don't support private sector involvement in our health and education systems.  View Paul's General Election communication

POLITICAL HERO... Probably a failing on my part, but I don't have heroes, political or otherwise.

FAVOURITE BLOGS...  How could it not be ConservativeHome, although I'm sure others will evolve.

FAVOURITE CH CONTRIBUTOR... Anybody who agrees with me, which probably most of the time is only me!

Comments

[Simon Chapman]

Why did you stand against Fiona Bruce, rather than support her campaign, Paul?

[Paul Kennedy]

At the time, I stood against the two main parties as well as the Lib Dems and UKIP, as I deemed no party worthy of my vote and as I have always voted in the past I had no option other than to stand myself and put my money where my mouth was, a rare concept nowadays. My campaign was not anti any other candidate, but rather about the state of our democracy. Approximately 40% of Warrington South's electorate also felt the same although they neither voted for me, which was my hope as in effect I was the "non of the above candidate", nor stood themselves. The small number of votes I polled had no effect at all on the outcome which was fair, I would of course have liked to have beaten UKIP and even better retained my £500 deposit, but such is life. Interestingly had I have stood on a single big local issue, I no doubt would have done a lot better, however no such issue existed.

[Victoria Street]

A sad and revealing fact is that the Labour MP for Warrington South - who beat you by 18,168 votes - was also born in November 1956.

[Paul Kennedy]

Yes 4 days after I was, but the number 13 has not been unlucky for her. ;)

Interestingly, Helen Southworth thought she might well lose the election and for a time at the count it looked that way. She realised that she was going to lose a fair number of votes to the Lib Dems over Iraq, which in fact she did, about 4,000. The forthcoming boundary changes to Warrington South are likely to favour Labour.

[Paul Kennedy]

PS Victoria, according to my records Mrs Southworth actually polled 18,519 more votes than me, although it was kind of you to reduce the level of my defeat. I was the Independent, rather than the UKIP candidate who indeed did poll 18,168 votes less than her. ;)

[Simon Chapman]

Paul,

Thank you. Please could you give a little more detail though. I was interested that, as someone who describes himself as a social conservative, which Fiona Bruce is, and bearing in mind the strong locally-based & values element to her campaign, you felt so strongly that she was a candidate you could not support, & yet you then applied to join the party & stand as a councillor so soon afterwards.

[Paul Kennedy]

Not so soon afterwards actually, and not without a great, great deal of thought and soul searching given my election stance.

Interestingly I did not know Fiona at the time of the election, nor even really during the election, although I had heard of her through the "Primary" although I didn't attend, and because she has a well known legal practice in my nearest village of Stockton Heath.

In the 2005 election no party was getting my vote irrespective of the merits or otherwise of individual candidates and that is actually the crux of the matter. I guess I could have sat on my hands and done nothing and not voted like the nearly 40% who didn't in Warrington South, I chose not to. Interestingly I did not choose to make my social conservatism a campaigning issue as I saw little merit in such a type of campaign, but clearly if voters asked for my opinion they would get an honest answer which they were then free to debate with me. At this point it is worth noting that whilst I consider myslf to be a social conservative, I am, for example, not against abortion per se, however I do think given medical advances the time limit needs reviewing and am very concerned that there is an increasing acceptance of abortion, albeit in some maybe now many cases being medically non invasive, as a primary means of contraception. I am aware that many social conservatives are totally against all forms of abortion and for whatever reason, although some who want to be slighly evasive on the issue use the term "Pro-Life", again I choose not to but rather be very open on the subject. Simon, if you wish to ask specific questions regarding my social conservatism on this public forum, then you are of course free to do so and I will, time permitting, answer them. Obviously I will not compare my views to those of other individuals as it is for them to answer for themselves.

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