Urgent call to tackle knife crime in Bedfordshire

Shocking news was released this week about new local knife crime statistics published by the Government.

The official figures published by the Home Office show that across Bedfordshire, there were 316 serious offences last year involving knives. 22% of all wounding, grevious bodily harm or robberies were committed with a knife in Bedfordshire Police force area

Conservatives are calling for a series of urgent measures to reduce knife crime, which include:

• Anyone convicted of carrying a knife should expect to receive a custodial sentence. Currently, the Government is planning to allow offenders carrying a knife to be let off with a fine in some circumstances.

• Making it easier for police officers to stop suspects and search them for knifes and other weapons, and increasing use of mobile knife scanners on the streets and on public transport (as already being successful trialled in London by Boris Johnson).

• Providing more custodial places for young offenders, and increasing support for drugs and education programmes, and tackling the causes of knife crime such as family breakdown, lack of school discipline and welfare dependency.

I am very concerned about these new figures showing the the menance of knife crime on our streets. This is a shocking indictment of Labour’s failure to tackle crime and its causes.

Our police have been tied up in so much red tape that they can only spend 14 per cent of their time on the beat fighting crime. At the same time our unprotected borders have allowed too many weapons and hard drugs to flow into our country. Labour have also failed to address family breakdown which sets too many young people on a path of crime.

Conservatives would start tackling this crime crisis by freeing our police from red tape and targets so they can be deployed on our streets to catch and deter criminals. We need stronger deterrent sentences such as a presumption of prison for those convicted of knife crime. And we will address the fundamental causes of crime like drugs and family breakdown.

Beauchamp Middle School - Brickhill

I have been out and about in Brickhill this evening and have just got home from attending the Beauchamp Middle School Year 8 Leavers' awards night.

The students all dressed up in their party clothes and behaved magnificently as the ceremony progressed. Over 120 awards were presented to the students in recognition of their hard work at the school.

As an ex pupil who now sits as the Chairman of the School's Governing Body I was delighted to be able to present tonight's top award. The winner had worked tremendously throughout her last year at the school - and was an outstanding example to many.

It was a great evening and I was delighted once again to have been invited to attend - thanks to all the organisers!

Yet another embarrasment for Gordon Brown

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has thrown away more than 120,000 ration packs in the last five years, it disclosed today.

The Armed Forces minister said that his department disposed of 122,086 "24-hour operational ration packs" (ORPs) between 2003 and 2007.

It means the MoD has thrown away food worth more than £1 million, and emerged at a time when the Government is urging people not to waste food.

Earlier this month Prime Minister Gordon Brown said: "If we are to get food prices down, we must also do more to deal with unnecessary demand such as by all of us doing more to cut our food waste which is costing the average household in Britain about £8 per week."

In a separate Commons answer, the Minister said the average cost of components in a 24-hour General Purpose ORP was £8.75.

It means the MoD has thrown away food worth at least £1,068,252.50 since 2003, though the figure may be higher because the cost of components in Halal (£9.34), Vegetarian (£8.89) and Sikh/Hindu (£8.77) ORPs is greater.

I believe Gordon Brown should take action to ensure that stocks are managed properly.
The MoD recently unveiled a new range of menu choices for the packs, which are designed to feed one soldier for 24 hours.

The hot weather packs are intended to prevent "menu fatigue" for service personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan. As it stands, it's cheaper to use fresh food than these ration packs, and that is utter nonsense.

Councillor Urges Minister To Join Him On Journey Of Discontent!

Figures released by the rail watchdog this week have reveal that overall customer satisfaction scores with East Midlands trains has fallen by 9%. Customer satisfaction has also dropped in nine other areas including punctuality, frequency of trains on the route and value for money.

These survey results are a shocking assessment as to the views of commuters on the quality of service provided by Easy Midlands trains - at a time of rising train fares, we see a corresponding fall in customer satisfaction.

With savage timetable cuts due in December I suspect the news will only get worse for commuters on East Midlands trains.

Having written to the the Department for Transport and East Midlands Trains this week; I urge them to reverse their decision on timetable cuts for Bedford and improve the provision of train services to and from Bedford.

The Government often tells us about how much they want to listen to us; so I invite Transport Minister, Tom Harris MP to join me on a commuter train between Bedford and London so he can listen first hand to the concerns of local commuters.

Bedford River Festival - Its not raining, so dont miss out!

Wow - what a buzz of excitement there is in Bedford Town Centre today! I have just popped home from watching the street parade; it was amazing.

I joined my sister and my niece to watch the parade from outside Wilkinsons on the High Street; at one point the crowd behind us was four people deep - there must have been over 5,000 watching the parade. For a couple of moments the umbrellas all went up; however that was only a short shower. Fingers crossed for good weather for the remainder of the weekend.

This years parade was larger than normal as we are celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the River Festival.Many local school and community organisations from the Bedford area have entered floats; in particular Hills Lower School, and Goldington Green Lower school - their floats were beautifully decorated; it must have taken them hours to set up.

Well done to everyone who took part. The festival continues for the whole of the weekend and is one of the regions biggest FREE events.

Free doughnuts and partisan propaganda won’t boost local democracy

I am deeply concerned that proposals by the Government to scrap vital protection for local taxpayers from wasteful town halls and ‘jobs for the boys’ corruption.

They also facing having to bankroll free doughnuts to bribe Labour supporters into voting, and allowing their salaried councillors to avoid turning up to meetings and vote ‘remotely’ instead. The proposals were outlined by Labour Ministers in a so-called ‘Community Empowerment’ White Paper.

I am backing to some of the proposals in the White Paper, such as :

• Greater scrutiny of unelected public officials, akin to Select Committees in Parliament.

• Promoting the transfer of assets to community management and ownership.

• Giving ‘backbench’ councillors more powers, such as through small budgets for their ward.

However, in the small print of the White Paper, there are a series of more controversial proposals:

• Doughnuts to vote: Electors are to be given ‘incentives’ to vote in local elections, such as entry into prize draws or free doughnuts. In these ways, Labour councils could mobilise the disillusioned and demoralised Labour core vote at taxpayers’ expense.

• Propaganda on the rates: The Government intends to tear up the guidelines which prevent taxpayers’ money being spent on partisan propaganda by town halls.

A survey by the Taxpayers’ Alliance last December highlighted that publicity spending by town halls has already soared to £450 million a year. The new partisan local publicity will be on top of the new taxpayers-funded Communications Allowance which funds partisan propaganda by Labour MPs.

• Jobs for the boys: Labour Ministers want to weaken anti-corruption rules which prevent council officers from being councillors, because so few people want to stand as Labour candidates to stand in local elections.

Yet these rules were drawn up in the 1980s to stop local civil servants becoming politicised and preecnt conflicts of interest. • No need for councillors to attend meetings: Under new plans for ‘remote’ voting, councillors will not have to turn up at meetings. They will be able to vote and participate in meetings ‘remotely’. This will make it easier for Labour councillors to hold down multiple jobs, on top of cashing in on their councillor allowances.

Councillors have a valued role to play in holding town halls to account, and act as champions of the local community. Yet I am concerned that the Labour Party wants to push through partisan laws that will allow them to bribe their voters, bring back jobs for the boys and slip in back-door state funding. “But rather than these highly controversial changes, if Ministers were genuine about local democracy, they would hand back the powers that unelected regional assemblies and Whitehall quangos have seized from local communities. Unfortunately Labour are moving ahead with a barrage of new quangos which will take even more powers away from local communities. Only Conservtives will give these powers back to local people where they belong.

Bedford River Festival - This weekend!

Don't miss out on a fantastic fun-packed weekend to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Bedford River Festival.

The festival offers a fantastic fun-packed event for all the family next weekend. For those who remember the first festival, this biennial event was launched in 1978 and organised for the enjoyment of all and to celebrate the opening of the river link between Bedford and the Wash.The festival has grown over the years and now features a carnival parade, fireworks, live music stages, historial re-enactments and lots of messing about on the water.

The idea beind the river festival has always been the same since its humble beginnings; a great, free family festival reflecting Bedford and celebrating the river and the town's glorious Embankment.

For further details visit: http://www.bedfordevents.co.uk/

It all kicks off at 12 noon this Saturday. See you there!

Armed forces still suffering from a shortage of medical staff

When will the Government give our armed forces the right resources and support services they need? It was revealved today that the armed forces are still suffering from a significant shortage of medical staff.

A year ago the Conservatives described the situation as "alarming", but 12 months on the Army has less than half the anaesthetists it needs and just a quarter of the required radiologists.

The shortages were revealed by the Armed Forces Minister in a House of Commons written answer to shadow defence secretary Dr Liam Fox.

The figures showed:

:: A 75% shortfall in Army radiologists
:: A 71% shortfall in Army Intensive Therapy Unit (ITU) nurses
:: A 62% shortfall in Army emergency medicine nurses
:: A 58% shortfall in Army radiographers
:: A 53% shortfall in Army anaesthetists
:: A 46% shortfall in Army orthopaedic surgeons
:: A 41% shortfall in Army general surgeons
:: A 21% shortfall in RAF medical staff

While many of these figures have dropped since last year, the shortfall in anaesthetists actually went up.
The figures also revealed significant shortfalls in crewing levels for Naval Merlin helicopters (39%), Harrier GR7 pilots (48%) and Harrier instructors (57%), as well as leading aircraft controllers (44%).
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Instead of flying around the world in a private jet, I believe that Gordon Brown and his Government should do the decent thing and give our armed forces the resourses that they need!