This is the latest in ConservativeHome's new ongoing series in which each week a different PPC provides us with an insight into life as a candidate and gives us a flavour of their own campaign and interests. If you are a candidate and are keen to be featured, please email Jonathan Isaby.
This week’s diary is written by Leah Fraser, candidate for Wallasey on Merseyside. Leah fought the seat in 2005, reducing Labour MP Angela Eagle’s majority, and was reselected in November 2007. Leah was raised in the constituency and is also a councillor for the Liscard Ward of the constituency on Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council. She first got involved in local politics when she set up a group to improve a play area in her community, eventually raising almost £100,000. Married with two children, Leah is also a school governor and also keeps in touch with residents through Facebook, Twitter and her regular blog.
Save our services
Wirral has a Labour/Lib Dem-led Council. Their decision to close 11 of the Borough’s libraries, along with plans to close leisure centres, museums and theatres, led to more than 50,000 people protesting against the cuts. Many of the services the Council wishes to axe are in some of the most deprived parts of the Borough – including Seacombe in the Wallasey constituency.
This is the last Labour-held ward in the constituency, the other five were won by us in May 2008 with around 53% of the constituency-wide vote. Many people point to this result as evidence that the Council has no mandate for the cuts, particularly as no mention was made by Labour or the Lib Dems during the election campaign of their plans.
I called in to the Leasowe Recreation Centre on Sunday March 22 to meet with the organisers and members of the Disabled Swimming Club. They are very concerned about the Council’s plans and, having not been consulted at all, they are rightly worried about their future.
Later in the week, on Friday, I was pleased to welcome Jeremy Hunt, our Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, back to Wallasey, following the Shadow Cabinet meeting in Preston. This was his second visit to Wallasey in as many months. Last time, he met with campaigners at the Wallasey Village library, one of the 11 set to close.
This week, he met with some of the users of the Guinea Gap Recreation Centre in Seacombe, also threatened with closure. The people we met were part of the ‘Aqua Mobile’ class – teaching water-based exercise to the less agile. Classes like this are really important when helping people to improve their health, particularly as we can’t all afford private gym membership.
Jeremy was, as usual, keen to meet with people affected by the cuts and gave interviews to the Wirral Globe, one of our local newspapers, and Buzz FM, a Wirral-based radio station. We also took him to Seven Waves Community Radio Station in Leasowe for an in-depth interview on the challenges facing local media. He is pictured there, right, with me and Oliver Adam.
Sadly, there wasn’t time for Jeremy to visit the Wallasey Amateur Boxing Club, who were having a prize competition on Friday evening. I’m hoping to make the Club my ‘Social Action’ project for the next year or so – they do brilliant work to teach discipline and respect to young people who may otherwise just end up hanging around street corners. I’ve arranged to see the club managers again next week to get this moving.
The Wirral Globe also ran with news of our planned all-day protests at the two libraries in the Wallasey constituency which are set to close. I’m hoping for a good turnout of residents and campaigners as yet further proof to the Council that they have made a mistake and underestimated the strength of public opinion.
Local campaigns
While the campaign against the cuts is taking up a great deal of our time, I’m keen it doesn’t reduce our activity on other issues. On Monday, I delivered a letter with Cllr Ian Lewis to residents in part of Moreton, telling them of plans for yet another mobile phone mast. We had a fairly immediate response with many emails and calls.
I have also been in contact with Merseytravel, the Integrated Transport Authority, to see if they will pay for a pedestrian crossing on a busy road in the Egremont community, adjacent to an area of sheltered housing. The Council had previously rejected our request, stating there was no cash available, so I am hopeful Merseytravel will be able to come up with the goods. The road is an accident hotspot and, as a local councillor, I am keen for us to find a workable solution.
Skills, jobs and the local economy
Wallasey has a very high number of people not in work and the need to attract inward investment and jobs is always high on the agenda. I was pleased to call into the Twelve Quays Campus of Wirral Met College on Tuesday and meet with the Principal and Assistant Principal. I also met with some of the apprentices and students, including Keiron, an apprentice bricklayer. The situation at the Learning and Skills Council was the big news but, thankfully, it looks like Wirral Met isn’t affected by the capital funding problems we have seen elsewhere this last couple of weeks.
The continuing problems in the local economy were highlighted again with the sad news that local shipbuilder Cammell Laird is shedding jobs, as is Tulip International – the country’s largest producer of pork – with all 300 jobs going. The situation at Vauxhall, which I visited last month with Ken Clarke, remains serious and in need of urgent Government action.
A couple of days later, on Friday - and just before I was due to meet Jeremy Hunt - I met with the owners of a local recruitment company, Scantec. I knew the company from some work I did for them a few years ago and, having heard the College’s angle on the jobs situation, I was also keen to hear the problems in recruitment facing many employers.
Community activity
On Tuesday, the first of the week’s planned visits kicked off with the Annual General Meeting of the Friends of the North Wirral Coast Park. The volunteers do a wonderful job in maintaining a beautiful stretch of the Wirral coastline. Earlier this year, I went along and helped with some of the improvement works and learned how to install a picnic bench in the process.
The needs of older residents were also high on the agenda when I called into the New Brighton Pensioners' Lunch Club on Thursday. The club is based in the local community centre and I was pleased to help Celia out with the lunches but, by the end of it all, didn’t feel like cooking again that day! The Club provides a healthy, nutritious meal for just £2.50, great value particularly when so many pensioners in the area are feeling the pinch.
On Friday, it was over to the Woodside Ferry in Birkenhead for the official opening of the U-534 German Submarine exhibition. The submarine was recovered from the sea bed and eventually restored and now proudly exhibited by Merseytravel. I was delighted to attend – my late father in law, Ian Fraser VC, was a keen submariner and I know he would have loved this exhibition.
Party time
A constituency such as Wallasey needs a great deal of local campaigning, all year round, particularly when so many former Labour voters are now unsure of their voting intention. I attended two of the Association’s three doorstep survey sessions – in Seacombe on Monday and New Brighton on Wednesday. The responses from residents are always interesting – many now recognise me as the candidate without me having to give the full intro on the doorstep and the hostility to Labour is a recurring theme. So many former Labour voters are saying "never again" while there is no noticeable support for the Liberal Democrats anywhere in the constituency.
Thursday was a big day for the local party, with our Annual General Meeting. Usually, these meetings can be a bit dry but this year, we were electing a successor to our outgoing chairman, Ian Lewis. It was held at the fantastic new Floral Pavilion Theatre in New Brighton and I was really pleased to give the vote of thanks to the retiring officers. Cllr Lesley Rennie was elected chairman and our former MEP Jackie Foster (who is seeking re-election again in June) gave a brilliant speech on the European Parliament. Pictured are Association President David Fletcher, Jackie Foster, myself, Lesley Rennie and Ian Lewis.
As we had previously completed the delivery of the March newsletters to the constituency, we delivered around 600 of the Party’s national ‘In Touch’ newspaper on Saturday, in Saughall Massie and Wallasey Village. Chris Grayling’s plans to allow police to ground teenage yobs are prominent in the paper.
Next week's Diary will be written by Richard Cook, PPC for East Renfrewshire