My response to Peter Lilley MP on joint Lib Dem/Con election ticket

Dear Peter Lilley MP,

On hearing your comment's on BBC Radio 4s Today Programme, I thought I would explain from a campaigning perspective, in Scotland, why you are wrong.

Initially when you said;

'I can conceive that we might fight as a coalition,'

I did think initially you had perhaps overdone the Christmas sherry somewhat, either that or you were talking out your backside. 

On closer inspection however, I feel it is because you have the Liberal Democrats in second place in your own Hitchin and Harpenden constituency and it would therefore provide you with a job for many years to come - dream on my friend, dream on (and no, you aren't my friend).

There is no way on this planet that the majority of Liberal Democrats (including this one), irrespective of the party leaderships view, would ever stand on a joint election ticket with the Conservatives, and so far Nick Clegg has never indicated we would.

This particular paid up member of the Liberal Democrats would never campaign to help the Conservatives and given your party only has the one MP in Scotland I'd rather campaign to get rid of that one, and make Scotland Tory free, as it should be.

Kind regards,

Andrew Reeves
Lib Dem Member

The views expressed in this blog post, as in the majority of my blog posts are of my own opinion and not necessarily those of my employer, because our Party does not dictate.

Labour's threat to democracy - shut polling stations

A great article in the Times today revealing Labour's plan to close thousands of polling stations across the UK to save some money.

The Government should really be encouraging people to vote and take part in the democratic process in this country not stifling the process.

Other proposals in the Department of Justice working paper include; cutting the number of election staff, replace polling cards with e-mail requests, increasing candidates’ deposits (currently set at £500, returnable if the candidate gets over 5%), fixed-term parliaments and reducing security at the election count.

These proposals will save some money, I agree but we should encourage people to participate in the democratic process not hinder them.

However, it seems Jack Straw has now performed one of the quickest u-turns in political history and has told officials within the Department to drop those ideas, because apparently they were only ideas.

Good for Jack Straw for putting a halt to this but perhaps now he may put his officials to use and think of ways of encouraging more people to participate in our democratic process.