Andrew George
Promoting the
Politics of Courage
I’m running a positive campaign to restore decency and honesty to our politics. To build a brighter future. To combat those who want us to become more inward-looking, backward-looking, more self-absorbed. I’ll build a campaign for an outward-looking, forward-looking and compassionate country.
We’ve been misled by a privileged clique who’ve irresponsibly played on fears to stoke prejudice. We must get beyond the Brexit chaos they’ve dragged our country into. We must restore the things that matter for the sake of our children’s future – our NHS, our schools and the very sustainability of our planet.
Come and join a growing campaign team. We’re determined to win this seat back this time, to make the difference, to build a brighter future.
Many people say “you politicians are all the same”. That statement has never been more untrue. The choice here is stark:
Andrew George - Standing up for Cornwall
National campaigner, local campaigner, MP.
Andrew describes his role - "Seeking out the silent voices. Standing up to bullies. Fighting for justice”
Liberal Democrats - Building a brighter future
Nature recovery is an important priority. The UK is one of the most nature-depleted places on earth. Nature recovery is important to me.
Here's some of the kind of things i get up to when I manage to secure some spare time, like last weekend...
1. Completed my weekly midnight glow worm transect. I've been monitoring the ups and downs in numbers in recent years and am pleased that this year the task has become a more widespread project with other volunteers. Saw my first glow worm this weekend (but just one (and very well hidden!)). Hopefully numbers will grow in the coming weeks. I’ll keep you posted.
2. Joined a group quietly viewing the remarkable activity of Nightjars (one of our many summer migrants) at a local spot. Stunning views and sounds in the darkening skies; and the eerie almost cicada sound it makes when still.
3. Joined a group of runners on an 11.5 mile run around local footpaths and to review access points and landscape features. (And for those who’re asking, yes I’ve had my sanity tested, and I’m pleased and proud to acknowledge that I’m definitely not right in the head)
4. Completed a 2hr butterfly transect, in an area noted for the Silver-studded Blue. Noted half a dozen other species, including the remarkable African migrant, the Painted Lady, Meadow Brown, Speckled Wood and Red Admiral. I'm no expert and only act as bag carrier! But I'm trying to learn!
5. Commuted by bike to my office and other meetings on my constituency day - a 24 mile round trip.
The more you learn the more remarkable you realise nature is. And become aware just how extremely vulnerable our natural world is. We must do more to protect and promote it.
"We have far more in common with each other than the things that divide us"
The wise words of Jo Cox MP, who was brutally murdered 10 years ago by a right-wing activist.
Memory of thew wonderful Jo (then Labour MP for Batley & Spen) and other victims of the rage and hate which too often dominates public debate was the subject of my newspaper column this week.
Cornwall Live
I welcome this week’s Government announcement that the culling of badgers will end.
In 2014, Professor Rosie Woodroffe of the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) and I instigated the first community-led badger vaccination programme in the country. I then argued that culling could play no useful purpose in combatting Bovine TB in cattle. Bovine TB has had a severe and detrimental impact on hundreds of farms in our part of the world, and resulted in the slaughter of thousands of cattle at great expense to the taxpayer. It is frustrating that decades of potential progress have been lost by pursuing politically-driven rather than evidence-based measures.
Now, over a decade later, we're back to where we were. I therefore welcome the announcement and congratulate the Steering Group of the Bovine TB Partnership for their work in bringing forward these alternative proposals, based on the biosecurity of cattle alongside wildlife measures; with the support of vets, scientists, farmers and the NFU.
Enormous credit also to those like Bob Speechley who trained and qualified as badger vaccinators who offered a brilliant service to many landowners and cattle farmers across the countryside, and who did so much to promote this solution.
I well remember during the 1997 Inquiry when I served on the Agriculture Select Committee, when we were told that the DIVA test (ie. to Distinguish between Infected and Vaccinated Animals) was only about 10 years away. Now, almost 30 years on, we are told it should be available by 2030!
I will work with Government Ministers and farmers to monitor progress, and will support this evidence based approach.
Pictures include those from the 2014 launch of the first community-led badger vaccination project, including with anaesthetised badgers and the wonderful Professor Rosie Woodroffe, of ZSL.
Helping to address the serious, ongoing housing crisis will be the chosen purpose of my Private Member’s Bill, which will be presented for its first reading in Parliament next week.
Of course I appreciate that many will be disappointed I haven’t chosen any of the other dozen very worthy causes I had under consideration in recent weeks, and am grateful to the thousands of people who have taken the trouble to offer their thoughts, advice or simply to lobby me.
Lack of genuinely affordable homes is a most intractable and detrimental problem facing families here (just as in many other locations). Our housing market is a shameful and outward display of just how wide the widening inequality in this country really is. It rewards those wealthy enough to use our homes as a vehicle for personal investment and penalises those who struggle to afford their first home, whether to rent or buy.
I will initially draft the Bill to cover a wide range of options for government and local government. From planning mechanisms to make social housing more affordable, to planning controls to better manage the proliferation of second and holiday homes, especially in locations where they inflate local housing markets and cut housing stock availability for local families.
Many thanks all those constituents who took the trouble to contact me with their ideas and proposals. I want to reassure everyone that those health, environment, nature restoration, business development, food security and other measures can be advanced through other tools available to MPs. Those campaigns will also go on.
BBC Cornwall
ITV News West Country
Cornwall Live
First NOT Second Homes
Why are those guilty of historic child abuse given more lenient sentences than we would apply by today’s standards?
That’s what amazingly strong child abuse victim Caroline Eshghi is campaigning to put right. Shockingly, her abuser was released after just 8 months.
Would we hang someone today if retrospectively found guilty of a hanging offence when hanging was a sentencing option? Of course not.
And that’s why I’m strongly supporting Caroline by taking the campaign to parliament to change the law, and sentencing guidelines, to better protect children from abuse.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2d2kggr2e1o