I got back late last night from London where I have been since Saturday. I was visiting my friend Lisa at the weekend who, being a Scot, put on a great Burns Night for some friends and I Saturday. I stayed down in London though as I had arranged a meeting on Tuesday between Grandparent's rights campaigner Dorothy Fagge, from Saxby and Shadow Childrens and Families Minister Maria Miller MP.

That meeting was set up for Tuesday so I spent Wednesday working from an office in Westminster. It's a very odd place to say the least and not a place I can pretend to be that fond of. The place has the feeling of a bit of an old boys club and having never been much of a joiner, I find it a bit off putting. My own view is that it is a place of work and so if elected that is how I will treat it.

The meeting with Maria Miller went really well. Mrs Fagge has herself experienced the difficulty of access problems to her grandchildren, once through divorce and once through bereavement. We discussed the really positive role Grandparents have in their grandchildrens' lives and how sad it was they can often be the innocent victims in a messy divorce.

Mrs Fagge wants legal protection from Grandparents in such circumstances with a presumption that Grandparents will have access rights to their grandchildren unless there are strong and mitigating reasons why this should not be.

Maria told us that the role of the extended family was something which the Conservatives are looking at as part of a wider consideration of how to tackle the challenge of family breakdown. We were reassured that this will be on the agenda of a future Conservative Government.

I personally am very sympathetic to more rights for Grandparents, particularly as my own had such a positive impact on my upbringing. In fact they still have a positive impact on my life now as I often think in many daily situations, 'what would my Grandma and Granddad say if they were here now?" My Grandma in particular, who died three years ago this week, had a very succinct northern way of delivering advice, whether you asked for it or not!

Anyway, I try to keep my ramblings away from this sort of thing so needless to say I will continue to support Mrs Fagge and her campaign.

So now the Government has finally acknoweldged what the rest of us already knew. The UK is in recession and is doing a lot worse than most of our competitors.

According to figures received today, the UK economy shrank by 1.5% in the last quarter of 2008. It's the biggest contraction since 1980 when we were dealing with the effects of Labour's disasterous policies of the late 1970s.

Watching President Obama this week the contrast between the UK and the US could not be more stark. The US is heading into a new chapter with a young fresh leader at the helm who plans a new broom. We are stuck with the same people we have had since 1997, worn out, tired, lumbering soles whose only reason for being seems to be to hang on to power.

Andrew Percy and local carers have expressed shock on the announcement by the Humber Mental Health Trust that they will be closing the Bartholomew House in-patient unity in Goole from April. The closure will mean that patients will be forced to travel 25 miles to Cottingham or 42 miles to Bridlington for in-patient care.

Andrew says, "In 2007, the Trust first proposed closing Barts and myself and the Belgravia Carers launched a campaign to save the unit. Our campaign received massive support from local people, with over 1000 people signing our petition.

As a result of our efforts, the Trust agreed a reprieve and told us there would be no changes to Barts for between 3 and 5 years. That time has not passed and so we were all shocked to find out about the proposed closure.

I met with the Belgravia Carers group outside the unit on Tuesday and will be doing all I can to fight the closure."

UPDATE: I spoke to the Trust about this on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week and have now received a written response from them regarding my concerns. I have responded formally objecting to the closure and asking them to meet with myself and some of the carers. We shall see!!

Photo: Andrew and the carers outside the unit this Tuesday.

Businesses operating on the docks in Goole have reacted with anger to the comments of Government Minister John Healey who speaking in the House of Commons who has confirmed that there will be changes to massive increases in rate bills levied on businesses operating on the docks. The changes brought in by Labour have seen businesses landed with massive tax bills, back-dated to 2005.

Photo: Andrew Percy and David Davis MP at the Goole docks

Andrew Percy said, "The Minister's comments in the House of the Commons the other night are unacceptable. He confirmed that Labour have no plans to reverse the changes which business owners have said will cost jobs. The Minister actually tried to play down the impact the changes will have despite considerable evidence to prove that many of the businesses will not be able to afford the back-dated taxes.

This episode has proved one thing for definite, local Labour MPs have absolutely no influence with their own Government despite their unquestioningly loyal voting record. If ever you needed proof of the need for a change this episode proves it.

We must not give up the fight though, we must now hope that enough pressure can be applied to more senior Ministers so that they are forced into looking at the charges again."

I was delighted to read tonight that Labour have been forced into a humiliating climbdown on their plans to exempt MPs expenses from the Freedom of Information Act.

Thanks to the combined efforts of the Lib Dems and the Conservatives who have said they would fight the move, the Government has been forced to abandon their plans. I don't quite understand why Labour MPs thought there should be one rule for the public and another rule for them.

We already know that  Labour MPs use public money to promote themselves via the Communications Allowance which is an unacceptable use of taxpayers money.

Prospective Brigg and Goole MP Andrew Percy has slammed the decision by Prime Minister Gordon Brown to miss North Lincolnshire and East Yorkshire off his list of places visited in his so-called ‘recession tour’ undertaken last week. The visit will took in Wales, the North West, East Midlands, the South West but made no visit to our area, despite a number of high profile job losses locally.

Andrew says: “Given the fact that the Humber region is so important to the UK economy, I am frankly aghast that the Prime Minister has decided to ignore our region altogether. Our local economy is really suffering as a result of the recession with job losses seemingly a daily occurrence. Be it the steel industry, retail or manufacturing, the local economy is really struggling and hard working people are being put out of work through no fault of their own.

The Humber region is also a vital link to our export markets which will play an important role in getting through the recession and in building any sort of an economic recovery. It's a slap in the face to workers and businesses in our region that the Prime Minister decided to miss our area off his schedule.

At the very least, he should have had the guts to come to the Humber region and explain to the owners of businesses operating on the Humber docks why their businesses and local jobs are being put at risk by this Government’s changes to the way businesses operating on the docks are taxed.

It must be very embarrassing for Labour locally that David Cameron has visited our area on a number of occasions recently whereas Gordon Brown has chosen to snub the area altogether.”

A Happy New Year - if not somewhat belated! I was away in York with friends for New Year and then have had a touch of the man-flu since then so no blog posts for a while.

It looks as though 2009 is going to be quite a tough year as Labour's recession starts to take a hold. We all have to do what we can to support those who are put out of work locally through no fault of their own. It is such a shame that as a result of Labour's decisions we are going to be worse hit than most other developed countries.

My priorities will be to continue the positive campaigning we have been undertaking for the last few years. In contrast to the ceaseless negative attacks of Labour locally, we will continue to stand up for local people on the issue which matter to them. Local people know it is only the local Conservatives who bother with them all year round. Although, no doubt as we get closer to an election, Labour will pop up!! We won't be fooled, we know they only turn up when they want votes!

A Happy New Year again and I shall get some more posts up now that I have begun to feel human again, well half human!