Have too many Labour MP's been following this sign?

Brigg and Goole MP Ian Cawsey claimed a whopping £144,931, on top of his £60,000 salary, in extra allowances last year. According to the Scunthorpe Telegraph, those are the highest claims for any MP in North Lincolnshire.

They also appear to be the second highest for any MP in East Yorkshire (the top being another Labour MP). Mr Cawsey has form on big expense claims; in 2005-06 he claimed the highest travel allowance of any North Lincs MP. His defence then been that he drives around the constituency a lot! If you ask me no MP should receive any travel allowances for miles travelled in their constituency, that is part of their job. Travel to Westminster yes, but travelling around your constituency no. How many teachers or nurses do you know who get paid for driving to school or hospital!

This year's whopping £144,931 claim includes £3,265 for staionery. In fact quite a number of Labour MPs in marginal seats seem to have claimed a lot of public money for postage. A cynic could claim that that is using public money to promote oneself in a marginal seat by way of mass, unsolicited (are these allowed?) mailings to local people. I will leave it to local people to decide. Needless to say, the mailings I send to local people cost the taxpayer nothing!

In other news, yesterday I chaired a really interesting panel for the Yorkshire and the Humber Tenant Forum conference on Arms Length Management Organisations for Council housing. Tenants from across the region attended and I found it very informative.

Last night was the Brigg and Wolds Branch Fundraiser in Bonby. We filled the restaurant with about 40-50 people for dinner and raised quite a lot of money. Next week's its the turn of Axholme Central Branch and the Hook Ladies. I always enjoy fundraisers, good company and we get to make money to spend on campaigning. I suppose that's a lesson some Labour MPs should learn, raise your own money instead of using the public's so much.

 

I am a little late in blogging this because we have been changing websites. However, last week we had a meeting of the Lower Aire Flood Action Group to decide what to do next in our campaign against the Environment Agency's proposed catchment plan for the River Aire.

That plan proposes to increase flooding in the Lower Aire region (Snaith, Rawcliffe etc) and I recently tackled the Environment Agency about their proposal. They are now re-drafting the plan but the action group were worried that this would just be a simple re-wording of the original plan. We therefore decided to continue our campaign against the plan and we will be out and about gathering signatures on the petition I started some months ago. Hundreds have already signed and we hope to get many more.

 Read more on the Campaigns tab above and feel free to e-mail in if you want to sign the petition.

What more is there to say. Brown bottled the election because he would have lost seats like Brigg and Goole. Our local polling shows a movement to the Conservatives locally and so it is no surprise Brown bottled it. I have to say I knew that Labour MPs in marginal seats must be worried because my opponent here kept blogging that everyone was telling him he would win by an increased majority! The fact he published those silly blogs obviously meant he was nervous. Whilst I am sorry we wont have an election I relish the chance for 18 months more to campaign. We have barely got started here and we have so much more planned.

Despite the lack of an election I have been out and about this weekend across the constituency. I spent Sunday in Belton with quite a big team. Best of all, I picked up a couple of new volunteers and some new poster sites. Wherever I go people say how nice it is to see us, there is so much untapped potential in this seat and the fact that we are doing what we are doing is paying dividends. A proper campaign is what this seat needs and that's what my team and I will deliver.

Alas, I have got a Conference Cough though so I have spent today in the house doing admin jobs for the campaign meeting later. Anyway, I'm off for some more chicken soup!

It must be awful to be Gordon Brown at any time, but even worse this weekend. I personally hope that there is a snap election but I am hearing rumours that one of the marginal MPs who has advised against an election may not be a thousand miles away from here!!

If he chooses to bottle it then he will not be forgiven by the people. If there is no election Brown will have exposed himself as one of the most cynical double dealers in politics. It will become clear that his aim all along was to try to use the threat of an election to wrong foot the Conservatives. In doing so he will have taken the British public as fools and our job will be to expose that cynicism.

Labour really are wrong to think people don't see through their cynicism and spin. Take Post Office closures, my opponent here is running around trying to give the impression that everything is OK and that it's not really Labour's fault that 5 more Post Offices will close. I am pleased to say that local people are cleverer than that. One local resident told me she thought it a damn cheek that he dared to appear in the paper claiming to oppose the closure of the Post Office in Westfield Avenue, Goole. I am pleased to say however that whilst he was posing for photos I was actually contacting local residents directly on this issue.

As revealed in the local press this week, Labour are proposing to close the Post Offices in Eastoft, West Butterwick, Wroot, Reedness and Westfield Avenue in Goole.



I am 100% committed to fighting these closures and it is frankly a disgrace that our communities are to lose these vital resources. Our local Labour MP has implied that the reason our Post Offices are closing is local people's fault. More people might choose to use Post Offices if the Government hadn't stopped them offering services such as TV Licences or if they had allowed those who wanted to continue using pension books to do so.


I have launched a campiaign to save our Post Offices and I have already been around many of the areas that will suffer at the hands of Labour's Post Office closures. I wont let local people forget what this Government is doing to them and nor will local people let the local Labour MP off the hook on this one!

(Photos are of me at Eastoft and Westfield Avenue Post Offices)

Am busying myself here at the Conservative Party conference in Blackpool. The atmosphere is really very upbeat and we are all ready for an election. I have a few meetings today regarding the strategy for winning Brigg and Goole. I am meeting with a few groups this evening which have an interest in issues in the constituency which I am sure will be of use.

The best news to come from the conference thus far is our commitment to abolish inheritance tax on homes under £1 million and to take 9 out of 10 first time buyers out of stamp duty. I know how important that last pledge is for people of my age group who very often struggle to save for a deposit never mind pay stamp duty!

I spent some time yesterday talking to the Post Office representatives here. There is massive concern across Brigg and Goole about the forthcoming Post Office closure announcements which are due out imminently. I told them that I thought Post Office closures, the scrapping of second delivery and the scrapping of Sunday collections did little to ensure continued public support for our Post Offices. Maybe that is what the Government want, it would certainly make it easier for them to get their Post Office closures through!

I have to run off now and go to a meeting about the target seat campaign for Brigg and Goole.