Fighting student fees

The NUS has asked me to help in their opposition to higher student fees, and that's certainly something I feel strongly about.

I benefited - like most of today's government - from free university tuition. Today the students I teach graduate with a pile of debt. It's so unfair of us in the older generation to make them start their working lives with such a handicap.

Abolishing student fees remains a central plank of our policy in the Liberal Democrats. The Government (and the Tories are no better) has to be given the message that any increase will cost them votes and seats.A recent YouGov poll commissioned by NUS revealed that 88% of the public does not think the review should even consider increasing fees, while a majority believes that it should look at alternatives. Last year, research by Opinionpanel showed that a political party’s position on tuition fees would affect how 79% of students would vote in a general election.

NUS President Wes Streeting said:

“The vast majority of the general public is against higher fees, and although this review has been set up to report after the general election, voters deserve to know where their MP stands on this highly emotive issue.

I am delighted that Roger is standing up for students and their families in Macclesfield by signing up to this pledge. He has demonstrated his determination to give every young person a fair chance to go to university.”

www.voteforstudents.co.uk

Supporting CAMRA

In response to requests from consituents I've signed up to the CAMRA 5 point campaign to:

• Promote the interests of Britain’s pub goers
• Champion well-run community pubs
• Support the rebalancing alcohol taxation to support beer and pubs
• Press for reform of beer tie to deliver a fair deal for consumers
• Support the role of well-run pubs as solutions to alcohol misuse


Mike Benner, CAMRA’s Chief Executive welcomed my support, saying:

“We are delighted that Roger Barlow has promised to work to promote the interests of beer drinkers and pub goers. Well-run pubs make a huge contribution to community life, each of which injects £80,000 into their local economy every year. Amid growing concern over the loss of more than 5 pubs a day, it is now more important than ever to support well-run community pubs, to promote local brewers and to protect the interests of consumers.”

I remember when CAMRA first started - I was a student in those days - and I am proud to be asked to speak up for community pubs, local brewers and consumers. Well-run pubs are the bedrock of community life, and we are lucky to have many of them in and around Macclesfield. They are part of the solution to the problem of alcohol misuse and not part of the problem, which is caused largely by cut price supermarket selling. They deserve our support.

Meet the local Liberal Democrats in Poynton at the weekend. They're a cheerful and enthusiastic group. Going round the town centre we stop to retrieve some rubbish discarded in the tubs outside the old cinema and drop them in the nearby bin. (The newspaper under my arm is the Macclesfield Express, which is not part of the rubbish. Definitely not!) Later I get shown the skateboard rink, where youngsters are performing quite amazing acrobatics on their BMX bikes, happily enjoying themselves out of earshot of the neighbouring houses. I've promised myself a trip to the Anson engine factory when it re-opens.

Winterton's views on rail travel

Sir Nick has shown yet again that he absolutely doesn't get it. MP's should travel first class? First class travel is an outrageously priced , for the pampered few who are travelling at someone else's expense - in his case that's us taxpayers.

If he really said that there are 'a totally different type of people' on standard class trains it goes to show he's completely out of touch with the real world and real people. MPs are supposed to represent their constituents, not to be separated from them in some elitist haven. An MP should be glad to take the chance to make contact with the people who voted them into office - or who might vote for them next time.

I travel on trains a lot. Standard class, of course: the university can't afford to squander its money. And do you know, standard class arrives just as punctually (or otherwise) as first class? I get a lot of work done on trains - and so do many of the people round me. That's not an argument. I'm sure his views are not shared by the people of Macclesfield.

Support for Carers

I've been asked to support the campaign run by Carer Watch for an immediate review of the present benefit system, and I'm delighted to do just that. The present allowance of £53.10 is miserly and insufficient, and it's all hung about with regulation and restriction. There are many in Macclesfield whose care for their elderly or infirm family members lifts a burden which would otherwise fall on society (and the taxpayer), and we should recognise the sacrifices they make.

More cash would close the rich/poor divide in education

I've just received the details of what the Liberal Democrat 'Pupil Premium' would mean here. It would allocate around £ 26 million of extra cash to Cheshire schools, which would the funding for disadvantaged pupils to private school levels.

And we can afford it. The whole policy costs £2.5 bn a year, and will be paid for from reforms to tax credits (which will save £1.5bn) and administrative savings in the Department for Education and quangos (which save an additional £1bn).

I'm so glad I'm not in the Labour party! 12 years in power and the inequality between rich and poor gets wider. And it starts in education:

• The poorest children are only half as likely as their better-off classmates to get 5 good GCSEs
• Last year one in three children left primary school without being able to read and write properly
• Nearly 10,000 5-7 year olds are taught in classes so big that they are illegal
• More than half of all applicants accepted to degree courses in 2008 were from the top two social classes

One would expect that from a Tory government which believes, at root, in the class system, But it must be hard for the ordinary Labour party members to see what's been commited in their name.

Poynton developments

I've been shown round Poynton town centre - it's certainly getting a makeover.

There is still a way to go - and there are still many aspects that have got to be got right. Parking in particular - people need to be able to pop in to a newsagent or chemist without messing around with parking fees.

But the signs are good. There's strong local involvement in the proposals and the developers re listening. The scheme will calm the traffic, and it will help keep the centre alive and welcoming for residents and visitors.

Such a contrast with the scheme for redevelopment in Macclesfield! Cheshire East planners and consultants have ignored the views of locals, and put forward a bland scheme that would turn a truly individual town into a collection of chain stores that could be anywhere. Still the good news is that the recession seems to have put that on hold - hopefully until wiser voices can be heard.

Saving the High Street

The numbers show that the recession continues to bite in the High Street. The 2009 survey from the Local Data Company has shown that the proportion of empty shops has risen, with 13% of the Macclesfield premises vacant. That's worse than the national average of 12% and much worse than comparable Wilmslow (5%) and Altrincham (6%).


The Government’s skewed planning system has seen supermarket giants squeeze the life out of towns and now almost every high street in Britain is an identical collection of chain stores and coffee shops. Macclesfield still has a centre with real character thanks to individual local businesses. It's vital that in any redevelopment these are enabled to survive and grow.

The Liberal Democrat vision is to stop this decline and rebuild vibrant local high streets. This requires a level playing field that allows small and large businesses to flourish alongside
each other. It won’t happen without government action. That’s why we have developed a
range of plans to ensure that high streets remain at the heart of our communities.
These include:

• Ensuring a long term future for the Post Office by developing new services
such as a PostBank
• Direct help for businesses by reforming business rates, reducing
employment taxes as soon as possible and cutting red tape
• Providing fair access to credit by getting the banks to lend again and
creating a more diverse financial infrastructure
• Creating a fairer marketplace by ensuring sustainable retail development
and taking a more localised approach to competition

As Nick Clegg says:
“Our high streets have borne the brunt of this recession, with boarded up shops scarring towns and villages across Britain."

What are the issues?

It’s been a pretty dull election so far, hasn’t it?

Macclesfield is hardly awash with election fever. When I meet people and introduce myself as the Liberal Democrat candidate their reaction is invariably polite, but you can tell that the election is not the most important thing on their minds.
Even the national media has failed to get the public to wake up and take an interest, despite doing its best to build big stories around Brown’s dithering (not much new there) or Cameron’s confusion as he tries to please everyone with pre-election promises (not much new there either).

So I can forgive electors for lack of enthusiasm for the platforms of the two main parties as I set out to convince them that what we offer from the Liberal Democrats truly is different. That we can fix the parliamentary system and not just fudge it. That we can lift the tax burden off the lower paid and make Britain a fairer place to live in. That we can simplify the benefits system, making it easier for those in real need and harder for frauds to cheat. That we can sort out the banks so they stop paying themselves gross bonuses with taxpayers’ money. That although the massive public sector deficit the Labour Government has gotten us into has got to be cut, this must be done carefully and sensibly, not with the draconian enthusiasm of the Conservatives which would stall the fragile recovery, or (to use a more seasonal metaphor) blast the green shoots with a hard frost.

Anyway, let’s hope that in Macclesfield, at least, voters overcome their apathy and turn out in force on May 6th – or whenever the date turns out to be.

Macclesfield Pensioners miss out in the cold

3,780 pensioners in Macclesfield could be losing £25 a week in the freezing weather.

Cold weather payments of £25 a week are issued automatically to help pensioners pay their fuel bills in severe weather – and in Macclesfield we have had 3 such weeks already so far this winter, making £75. But not all pensioners get them – only those claiming an extra benefit, like Pension Credit, which is used to top up those on small pension.

But many pensioners who could claim Pension Credit don’t do so. According to the Government’s own figures an estimated 3,780 of these 1.7M pensioners outside the system live in the Macclesfield constituency.

The good news is that it’s not too late, as claims can be backdated for 3 months. If you (or a friend or relative) might be missing out, call the Pension Service on 0800 99 1234, or go online.

Labour has failed pensioners by creating a complicated system that makes it difficult for them to get the help they desperately need. The Government should be making every effort to identify pensioners who are missing out and get them this extra cash.