Thank you for your support. I’ll continue to campaign for Cornwall
I am deeply grateful to have been granted a majority in the Cornwall Council election. It will be an honour to represent the people of Heamoor, Ludgvan, Madron, Gulval, Zennor, Morvah, Newmill and surrounding hamlets and moors.
My thanks to previous incumbent of much of the new ward, Conservative Simon Elliott, who was gracious and kind in defeat. Our politics may be diametrically different. But there is no personal animosity and I look forward to working with Simon as a valued Ludgvan Parish Councillor – after all Party politics is largely irrelevant to the vast majority of local matters which require effective resolution.
My gratitude also to retiring Liberal Democrat Councillors Mario Fonk and Helen Hawkins who represented (respectively) the Heamoor & Gulval and the Madron areas of the new ward. Like Simon they were excellent local representatives who have set a high bar for me, in what is a much larger ward! Their wise counsel, support and advice will be much appreciated.
Whatever satisfaction there may be in winning this local contest is more that outweighed by my deep disappointment at witnessing the defeat of so many good people – not just fellow Liberal Democrats but Independents, Greens, MK and Labour. Many whom I could happily have worked in partnership with (as I’m sure would they) to put the best interests of Cornwall above Party politics.
The election result is very bad news for Cornwall. Bad news for our environment, families in need, local families who suffer the consequences of worsening housing injustice, for our health and social care and for our children’s future. I will do all I can to seek out the silent voices and to speak up for them, to fight for those who find it difficult to fight for themselves, to combat climate change and environmental damage. The Conservatives want Cornwall as a property speculators’, second homers’ and developers’ paradise. I will do all I can to resist this and to fight for housing justice for local families in need.
When it comes to the handling of practical casework, as I explained to the many people I spoke to, I do not claim to have a magic wand which can resolve the many challenging and in some cases irresolvable problems which local people face. For example, our roads and infrastructure were not designed with the modern day volume and nature of vehicles in mind. Although I would personally prefer to put our residential areas, pedestrians and public health well above cars and lorries and to ensure there’s enough space for people to park without creating neighbourhood tension this would involve a major shift in the attitude and priorities of a majority of people who feel they depend on their vehicles.
I will be making further announcements in the coming weeks – about how and where to contact me with casework and Council matters. There will be an induction to the Council process which I must complete hopefully by the end of this month before I’m fully fledged. I hope those who need my assistance will bear with me until I have completed these processes
About 12% of Cornwall’s electors (37% of those who actually voted) voted Conservative this week. But the Conservatives took 54% of the seats and therefore 100% of the power to now run the Council for the next 4 years. I do not believe this is what the majority of people think is either right or satisfactory.
More than half the seats the Conservatives won were against a selection of candidates who had more (values) in common with each other than with the Conservative candidate who won.
Something to (more than) reflect on…