There has been so much going on of late, I am finding it quite hard to keep up with my blog so I shall try to catch up over the next few days.

Last week I took some time out to meet with farmers on the Isle of Axholme, courtesy of Caroline Ellis of the NFU. I've done a couple of these meetings through the NFU and have also arranged my own farmers forum with Shadow Minister Jim Paice MP. It is always great meeting with farmers as it is such an important area of policy.

As usual, quite a wide range of topics were raised and they had some genuine concerns which I shall be more than happy to take up if elected. For me, it is vital that we support farmers in staying in business and we have to do that in various ways.

I always said Labour would get nasty in the run up to the election and they are. Poor Keith Moore, their hapless Councillor in Goole, has penned a poisonous letter to the Goole Times this week regarding donations from non-doms.

No mention of Labour's non-dom donor Lord Paul. A close friend of the Prime Minister who apparently gave money to Brown's leadership campaign. He has just been made a Privy Councillor, no connection of course though ...

It looks as though I am going to have to start reminding local people about which party has an MP in the region who is facing prison for allegedly abusing the expenses system. Who was it who was claiming taxpayers money to pay to rent to that same MP ...

Labour should be more careful with their language.

We've had a very nasty leaflet go around Burton and Winterton from Labour regarding the Flixborough Grange wind farm application. This is the issue the Labour MP took no interest in until he realised which way the wind was blowing, pardon the pun!

Anyway, Labour have circulated a nasty leaflet which personalises the issue regarding the politics of the landowner. However, more serious is an allegation regarding the designation of the land on which the wind farm is proposed.

Labour are clearly worried that the wind farm will be approved on appeal because Labour's planning policies make it very hard to stop them. Labour Minister after Labour Minister have confirmed that they want to see more wind farms.

The local Labour MP is accusing the Tories of changing the designation of the land on which the wind turbines would be sited. A little research however shows that, far from it being the Tory Councils fault, the removal of the designation was approved by the Labour Secretary of State!! This only happened because Labour legislation, which the local MP supported, required a review of these planning policies. Talk about hypocrisy! Just like when he voted for more gypsey and traveller sites and then pretended to be opposed to them locally!

Quite a staggering attempt to pull the wool over local peoples' eyes.

Worse than that, it now transpires that the Labour Council has failed to use a separate land designation which is in force locally to fight the wind farm appeal.  That is the following policy -

LC7 – Landscape Protection

Residents are right to ask why Labour are telling so many lies locally. We know they have a history of nasty campaigning in our area, this looks like the latest in a long line. No doubt we will have even more as we head to the election!

I just read Labour's general election slogan, 'A future fair for all'. I assume they dont mean the kind of fair that has dodgems and hook-a-duck.

They would perhaps do better if that is the kind of fair they did mean. Given that the gap between the richest and the poorest has risen since Labour came to power, the number of young people unemployed has increased, the gap between the top 10% performing schools and the bottom 10% performing schools has increased and they have saddled generations to come  with record levels of national debt, I don't really think Labour are the people to talk about fairness.

Actually, it is a big own goal, their slogan will simply remind people how unfair Britain has become under Labour; criminals are better treated than victims, those who saved for their old age have been punished and those who try to do better for themselves and their families are simply saddled with more taxes and more government interference!

In other news the Scunthorpe Telegraph today reported the fact that Ladbrokes have us as favourites to win here. We certainly find nothing on the doorstep to suggest anything other than that. I suspect Labour will hope that they can buck the trend. Well, all I can say to that is look at the last three elections, the Labour MP has got less votes in every election and the majority has fallen. On the doorstep we rarely have him mentioned, not like in some seats I've canvassed in.

Anyway, we may not be long from an election now!

If you needed any more proof about the impact of the recession on the Humber region, you only have to look at the jobless figures released yesterday. In North Lincolnshire, the number of people claiming Jobseeker's Allowance is now at the highest level since July 1996. The January figures show that 5,222 people In North Lincs are now claiming the allowance along with 7,477 in the East Riding which also saw a rise. It is what is going on behind those figures which is really worrying.

Nationally, we now have a higher youth unemployment rate than when Labour came to power, the number of long-term unemployed has risen in the quarter to December to 663,000, also the highest figure since 1997, and we now have a record high of 8.08 million, more than 21 per cent of the working age population, classed as economically inactive.

Every Labour Government has left office with unemployment higher than when it came to power and these figures show that this one will be sadly no different.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, we now have news today that the public finances have deteriorated further. It has just been announced that the Labour Government had to borrow £4.3bn in January. The first time ever a government has had to borrow in January since records began. So much for Gordon telling us we were best placed to weather the recession.

The first into recession, the last out, the deepest recession since the war, record levels of youth unemployment and staggering levels of national debt. All thanks to a Labour Government. Cheers Gordon!

Someone has just pointed me in the direction of Ladbrokes, who have released their odds for every constituency in the general election. The Conservatives are the run away favourites in Brigg and Goole according to their odds and so there isn't much to be made here betting on the Conservatives. 

Further bad news for Labour too judging by the comments I've had from residents about some leaflets Labour have sent out in the constituency. As one resident commented, Labour have been invisible locally and have now started copying Conservative leaflets as we get close to the election. Exactly as I predicted, but then they do say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. More like a cheap knock off though.

Sadly though the Labour MP couldn't even get the county name right on the addresses, choosing to use Humberside on the mailings. Only a few months ago he was boasting about wanting Humberside removed from addresses for good. Ouch! Thanks to the angry residents who contacted me to point this out.

As if it couldn't get any worse, he chose to have these leaflets delivered by the Royal Mail's private sector competitors TNT! So for all the bluster about supporting the Royal Mail and local Post Offices, when it comes to Labour putting their money (or possibly Union money) where their mouths are, they decide to stick their feet in instead!

And that ladies and gents is why Ladbrokes presumably have the Tories as run away favourites to win here. Poor Labour!

Just a quick blog post to let you know that I'm going out on patrol with the Police in Snaith this evening, Cllr. Caroline Fox is coming along too. We've already seen some alcohol seized from under-aged drinkers near the railway line.

Update. Had a good time out last night with the police and East Riding Safer Communities (see photo). It was fortunately quite a quiet night with just a small quantity of alcohol seized. This did allow me to chat to local PCSO Michelle at length about policing locally. I was actually surprised by how many people stopped to talk to us and to give us information about one or two local issues.

The police are doing some good work locally and Caroline, Gordon and I are keen to support them.

I also managed to pick up some new casework outside the Sports Hall where a boxing competition was being held. One of the spectators, having seen us outside, popped over to ask if I would be able to help her friend which of course I will.

Another fantastic weekend on the doorstep where the results were once again very positive. All our polling has shown that the swing to the Conservatives in Brigg and Goole is much bigger than the national swing and we are certainly finding this on the doorstep. This Saturday we had about 8-10 people door knocking for about 5 hours and in the whole time we found a couple of hundred new pledges and just 6 Labour voters! The Labour brand locally seems to be especially tainted by what we shall simply call 'mortgage-gate'. When we canvass at the moment, quite a few of the switchers tell us one of the reasons they are switching is because of the expenses abuse of certain local Labour MPs.

Last night I had a great time at the Barnetby Craft Clubwhere I collected a £100 cheque for the Climb 4 Heroes appeal which I have been supporting (see photo). This appeal will see four local lads climb Mount Kilimanjaro to raise money for the Help for Heroes charity.

I raised some money for the lads just before Christmas and also agreed to put their appeal on my next local newsletter, funded at no cost to the taxpayer of course! As a result, I've had a fair few people contact me to donate money. The Barnetby Craft Club had also seen the story and decided to donate a £100 to this great cause.

I had a great welcome at the club last night where I received two lovely hot cups of tea, which were just what the doctor ordered given the bad weather outside! Thanks to the ladies for both the warm welcome and for the money they have raised.

It's been an NHS few days with news coming through that the campaign we have supported for a new NHS dentist in Snaith has moved a step forward. This has been a long campaign, with many people involved and much of the pressure for a new dentist coming from Snaith Town Council. Needless to say though the Labour MP has issued a quote which basically suggests it's all his doing. I wonder if there will be a photo of him to accompany this quote in the papers this week!

Local people are not fools, they remember who changed the system and took the dentists away in the first place. Labour's new NHS dentistry contracts saw communities up and down the country lose their dentists. The real heroes are the Town Council who kept up the pressure and of course the local NHS Trust who are after all the ones who found the cash for this.

If you would like to register for the new dentist which should be open in the Spring please call the dental team on 01482 315775 and leave details on the dedicated answering machine or email dental@erypct.nhs.uk.

I also spent a couple of hours yesterday meeting with the Chairman of the Yorkshire Ambulance Trust, Dr Nick Varey (see photo) at the HQ in Wakefield. I wanted to talk about a couple of local issues relating to Goole and so Nick very kindly arranged for a member of one of the crews to be present too.

I also got a tour of the call handling facility which, along with York, takes calls from the 6,000 square miles the Yorkshire Ambulance Trust is responsible for. The technology was amazing, I didn't realise that they can, and very often do, dispatch ambulances to someones address before the actual 999 call has been answered!

Sad news yesterday that unemployment in both North Lincolnshire and East Yorkshire has risen whilst there was a small dip in the rest of the country. We all know that Labour's recession is biting hardest in the north and this seems to confirm it. Sadly, Labour MPs seem immune to the pain here having just voted themselves another 12 day holiday in February, Lib Dems and Tories voted against. I suspect there are plenty of people looking for work locally who would happily vote Labour MPs a very very long holiday.

In terms of unemployment locally we are just not getting any leadership from our politicians. Where is their plan for the area, what are their big ideas, where is the vision. These are same Labour politicians who bemoaned the loss of manufacturing under Mrs Thatcher but who happily sit in a party which has overseen the biggest contraction of manufacturing ever with all the added impact that has in an area such as ours. It's appalling.

I just had some canvassing back this evening from somebody who has been doing what should be a very safe Labour area in the constituency. My word is it bad out there for Labour!!