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HELLO & welcome to my weekly update no.328
After a wonderful extra hour in bed with the clock change…it is now dark before you receive this email on a Monday evening. In Westminster we are debating migrant hotels and prison escapes. Locally we will hear this week if Surrey is split into two or three for the unitary elections. And forget Katy Perry (if you are a former Canadian PM)...the showbiz event of the year is at the Borough Hall in Godalming on Friday when I talk about my new book Can We Be Great Again? in aid of the Royal Surrey’s new cancer centre - details about tickets below!
WESTMINSTER WHISPERS
MIGRATION MADNESS The mistaken release of an illegal immigrant sex offender caused uproar over the weekend. Thankfully he has now been apprehended but apart from the incompetence of letting the wrong man go, how did it get to this? David Lammy answered questions in the Commons today but the big issue is that we are not controlling our borders and all governments (mine included) have taken too long to grip the issue. Rwanda should not have been cancelled, the ECHR needs reforming or quitting and illegal arrivals should be detained in camps not hotels until they can be deported. Why? Because if we want to remain a country that is generous to refugees and open to the brightest and best from around the world, people need to feel their elected representatives actually can control who comes in and out. Please do what it takes and sort this out Sir Keir! As a human rights lawyer our PM is literally the best person of all to work out and implement the changes needed.
BUDGET BLUES The underlying cause of our budgetary pressures is the massive rise in our national debt, now costing the average household nearly £4,000 a year in taxes to pay the interest owed. This is the elephant in the room the budget needs to address and there are solutions as I wrote for the Financial Times on Saturday. You could also check out this video which has a snappier version of the arguments (alas we are in a Tiktok world).
DOCTORS’ STRIKES Resident doctors have announced another round of strikes over pay in November and I strongly support the tough line the Health Secretary is taking. But it is partly because the £9 bn pay rise announced by the government in its first year in office made them look like a soft touch. My own battle with resident doctors (then called junior doctors) was to get more of them working on Saturdays. But the bigger question is why there is still so much inefficiency in the NHS when we are now one of the highest spending OECD countries in terms of health as a proportion of GDP? Part of the answer is that it is micromanaged with so many targets that managers do not have the flexibility to make sensible changes that would improve efficiency, as I discussed with Suhail Mirza on the Voices of Care podcast. We don’t have any national targets in the schools sector - yet standards have risen to give us some of the highest reading scores in the Western world and they are generally highly efficient.
LOCAL LIFE
STOP THE DELUGE Surrey County Council are planning to implement vital flood reduction measures in Ash Vale and Ash ranges to deal with severe rainfall. They are looking at ‘natural’ measures such as hillside ponds to collect the rainwater and reduce flood risk. Find out more on Thursday October 30th at the Ash Centre, Ash Hill Road where Surrey will outline the plans.
GODALMING BOOK TALK We have released a few more tickets for my talk about my new book Can We Be Great Again? in the Borough Hall Godalming on Friday night. Tickets are free of charge and all authors' royalties from book sales (locally or nationally) go to the new Cancer & Surgical Innovation Centre at the Royal Surrey so you are supporting a great case!
CIL HOMEOWNERS NOT HAPPY More woes for Waverley Borough Council who last week were accused of ‘marking their own homework’ by the victims of huge CIL charges. To date only two of the twenty known victims have applied to the Council's review scheme - why? Because the review WBC has put in place is ‘loaded against them’ and does not address or resolve the issue. They do not trust the LibDem council on the issue - don’t take my word for it but listen to residents Rupert Wingfield, John Crawford and Ian Colvin in this BBC podcast. Please Waverley sort this out.
THE MONEY PIT is 69 High Street, Godalming’s unofficial rebranded name after Waverley Councillors debated a further £540k cash for cost overruns last week, taking the running total to £5.4m and counting. Is spending £5.4m on one unit the best way to enliven a high street? Godalming Councillor Peter Martin said the payback on this extraordinarily bad value project would be 47 years.
CRANLEIGH DOWNSLINK RESURFACING so the stretch between Elmbridge Road and Knowle Lane is to be closed between October to mid-December. The Downslink is a vital pedestrian link for Cranleigh so it will be worth the wait when it is redone.
TESTING TRAFFIC Traffic lights on Flambard Way Godalming between Waitrose and Sainsburys are undergoing a full refurb from now until the 14th November - so avoid them if at all possible. And don’t forget the full weekend closure of the A3 in both directions from M25 junction 10 Wisley interchange and Painshill roundabout from 9pm Friday, October 31 until 6am on Monday, November 3.
DON’T SUFFER WITH DENTAL PAIN! The White House Dental Practice in Knaphill near Woking, has contacted me to say it is offering people without access to NHS dentistry urgent dental care services. Please contact the Practice on 01483 473 850, email: [email protected] or visit www.wokingdentists.co.uk for support.
SPOOKY HALF TERM FUN It’s a double this weekend with Halloween this Friday 31st and then many bonfire events upcoming. This Saturday Cranleigh, Godalming and Bramley, then Tongham on Sunday 2nd and Chiddingfold on Sat 8th to name a few! And in the meantime if you fancy pumpkin picking with the kids here are a few options.
SURGERY CALLS Today's call was to a Compton resident with concerns about the government’s plan to regulate home education. He is doing a brilliant job educating his daughter who is above where she should be academically but is worried that it will now become impossible with all the extra bureaucracy. A number of parents have raised this with me so I will raise with the Education Secretary.
JOIN ME Want to get more involved with my brilliant election-winning team locally? Email me at [email protected] to help support our work in our community. If you would like more regular updates of my work locally and nationally, do follow me on Facebook, X (Twitter), Bluesky or Instagram (although email me rather than comment for a guaranteed reply.)
AND FINALLY if you’re family is anything like mine your house will be full of pumpkins this week - but why do we celebrate Halloween by carving a pumpkin? And here is the history of the pumpkin!
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