There was a minute’s silence at the start of the hustings for the victims of the terror attacks in Manchester and London.
The three candidates to become the next MP for Oxford West and Abingdon were Nicola Blackwood (Conservative), Marie Tidball (Labour), Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat). The event was at the Amey Theatre, part of Abingdon School, and was organised by The Church in Abingdon, and Abingdon-on-Thames Chamber of Commerce. Chris Bryan, Chairman of The Abingon Bridge Charity, chaired the meeting.
Alan Harris (UKIP) could not make it.
Candidates answered questions on Education, Brexit, and the NHS, during the first hour. There followed questions on local issues in the last half hour. These were: regenerating the town centre, house building, and local control of planning.
The current MP, Nicola Blackwood said improvements have been made in the precinct and Abbey Meadows, but that the Charter and the Guildhall still need more work. She said that footfall is not increasing enough. On Drayton Road traffic, and the Lodge Hill interchange on the A34 she said that although she had been let down on the guarantee given at the last election 2 years ago, there was now a new cast iron guarantee it would get funding. She also had something to say about the local BID (Business Improvement District). Nicola said “The BID is not working as well as it should. It should have made a real difference. But is is not doing what it was sold as.” There is a meeting of the BID tomorrow evening where local businesses will have their say about its performance after the first year.
Marie Tidball said Labour would provide better infrastructure in the way of roads and buses to allow people to get to local towns like Abingdon. She lamented that under the Conservatives subsidised bus routes have gone. Labour would also support small and medium businesses with an investment bank, and give help to small and medium businesses when they increase Corporation Tax generally.
Layla Moran would also look to increase footfall by making it easier to get to town on public transport, and give cycling a higher priority. She said there was a need for spending more of local business rates locally. She would also like to encourage more town centre events.
You don’t mention that protest outside? I heard someone say they were taking a picture for the blog
Over the last few weeks politicians at all levels have come over as a rather incompetent, dispiriting, duplicitous and bickering rabble … and now we’re supposed to choose … who … the least worst?
As I wrote here several weeks ago, May hoped to slip in some unpopular policies shooed in undercover of her being the only representative of popular Brexit support. She’s looked increasingly weak and confused, not that Corbyn and the Boy Farron have impressed.
I’m tempted not to vote as none of the local candidates instill confidence, though I will do so to help secure our current hopeless incumbent loses her seat.
On a non-partisan, objective basis, I think the Tories will regret not voting for Gove as their leader.
It was a pity that not all the questions accepted beforehand were asked. One of the results of this was that the international and moral issues got rather lost unfortunately – issues which are as important as the local ones facing us all
You have to laugh…
Nicola was ‘ let down on the guarantee given at the last election 2 years ago’
but now she has a ‘ cast iron guarantee it would get funding’
I know past performance isn’t meant to be an indicator of the future, but…
Fool me once….
None of the above, for me I’m afraid.
I have often wondered, can anyone answer about ‘spoiled papers’. If I did write NOA on the bottom, do they get ‘noticed’?. Registered as spoiled.?. What if everyone does that??.
Spoiled and blank papers are counted – less than 1% at the last General Election. In 2015, 34% of the electorate didn’t turn out: more than voted for any single party.
Not much of a ‘mandate’. If non-voters turned up and simply but a blank paper into the box, that would certainly register, because the blanks would be counted (and announced).
Please note that this is not advice!
“Nicola was ‘ let down on the guarantee given at the last election 2 years ago’ ” – by whom? We should be told. The diamond interchange at Chilton/Harwell went ahead very quickly and very smoothly, so why not north Abingdon?
Like Lyle Lanley above, her “cast iron guarantee” is not fooling me.
Colin, spoiled papers are counted, the numbers given out with the results. You will, of course be counted along with other protest ‘votes’ and the merely cretinous. Numbers are usually low and not newsworthy.
I think we should have a legal obligation to vote as citizens, the vote be held on an extra bank holiday to facilitate this, and that there should be a ‘none of the above’ choice. Would anyone ever be elected again, or would it force a raising of political discourse and standards? Certainly no politician would support it, I think.
Colin, it registers more if you decide not to vote (not just decide to not bother…but actively decide, after due consideration, not to exercise your right to vote – and exercise your right to withhold your vote).
If you spoil your vote, you’ll likely be lumped in with all those to silly to know what to do and filled it in wrong. But you DID turn up.
If you don’t vote, you may be lumped in with the layabouts who couldn’t be bothered, but at least you may get a knock on the door by an interested political party querying why you didn’t vote and perhaps next time you could vote for them.
Ref: Lodge Hill. My own belief is that the project is being held back due to that location being part of a much bigger interchange with the previously mentioned Oxford-Cambridge link road one of the possible locations for it to join the A34 would be between Lodge Hill and Bagley Woods with the road passing between Radley and Kennington leading to a river crossing somewhere thereabouts.
Obviously time passes and with no action the traffic just gets worse, I’m sure there are people out there who know the real reasons for Lodge Hill not being improved but it probably isn’t being talked about due to the massive opposition to a road development like that being located there… meanwhile we suffer.
All roads in to and out of the town have traffic measuring/survey equipment on them. So… something’s going on…
But it can’t surely be more housing, as the property market is going to collapse any afternoon soon because of brexit.
Daniel: I believe there is a wider speed survey going on but the data from the machines can also count axles or vehicle movements. Some of the data is used to see how effective existing speed limits are and whether changes or enforcement are required. The two rubber tubes generate air pulses as a car drives over them which are logged by the box of tricks chained to the post, when the tubes are close together they are just counting axles but when further apart as they all seem to be at present its speed thats being counted, so % of cars above 30 or 40 or 50 and below depending on locations/limits etc.
Badger – I think you are probably right. Last summer when there were consultation sessions about the Dunmore Road housing, the County Council officers there told me that all was lined up – so long as the last bit of funding came forward in the government’s Autumn statement they were “shovel ready” and the slip roads could be built by 2020. Then along came the Oxford-Cambridge expressway proposal and surprise, surprise, no mention of the A34 slips in the autumn statement. If NB really has that “cast-iron guarantee” why haven’t County Councillors who are trying desperately to get this in place been told that all is well, they don’t need to worry?
PS I am similarly dubious about her other categorical statement that Abingdon Hospital is not under threat.
To pinch a line I just saw on another blog l hope her supporters “won’t get fooled again”.
Hester: And of course an Oxford-Cambridge link road could be 10-15-20 years away once planning, consultation, public consultation, land purchase/compulsory purchase is completed… if ever!
The preliminary ideas for the road locations are on the web and I think on here somewhere, one less favoured suggestion points to it passing south of the town crossing the river south of the marina and joining the A34 north of Drayton which would link with the proposed road north from Didcot to Culham perhaps, however, the Lodge Hill improvement would then still have to happen to lighten the load on our town.
There is also the suggestion that the new expressway could be a toll road… can’t remember the last time I drove to Cambridge (maybe I’m in the minority though) but I guess it’s all the places it links in between meaning it could get like the M25 and be a victim of its own success.
Hester: Also regarding the Hospital, I think there is every reason to believe that it is under threat, if you look at the big picture funding being reduced everywhere, cuts, cuts, and more cuts, the clues are all there.
Everything seems to be on a ‘need to know basis’ and WE don’t need to know… until it’s too late.
And then there is the housing… you could get a nice development on that hospital site..
Now, who was that land development company who have been adding £10ks to Nicola’s constituency funds again each year ?
Oh yes, Countywide Developments Ltd
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=24842
Anyway, this expressway is a white elephant anyway, what we need is a monorail between Oxford and Cambridge, its the transport of the future.
Lyle: Very interesting re donations and yes I could quite easily see that and some other sites in town built on. Monorail… it’s a bit old hat isn’t it, what we really need is a hyper loop system 🙂
Nice to see a panel of women … And by the way, it’s genuinely disgraceful not to vote. Those who don’t vote have no right to complain.
How to register a protest if you really cant stomach any of the candidates is a challenge. Maybe it’s a bit of a microcosm of what we ask of our politicians – often having to choose between things, none of which they really want to do.
Personally I share Sarah and Old Ghost’s view that we should respect the people who fought for our right to vote, and turn up to vote no matter how we choose to mark our ballot paper.
73 years ago today, (D Day) a lot of brave people died to protect our right to vote. Please honour them by turning up.
I think my earlier email (still subject to moderation, but posted) went out under an incorrect name, due to my mis-typing. Age gets to you before you’ve had time to realise it!
it’s been pulled down; my fault!
My point was that you can register your voting choice (and get it counted) by posting a blank voting slip. This in NOT advice!
34% of the electorate did not vote in 2015 – more than any who voted for any single party. This is the lie of the so-called mandate.
While a majority of those voting in the referendum voted leave, they did not constitute a majority of the electorate.
Lies, damn lies and statistics: and we are invited to believe the numbers! I don’t believe any raw statistics – you can produce any numbers to support an argument.
Nonetheless, I have voted (postally) and agree with Iain and others that we should vote – whatever mark we make on the paper.
I couldn’t agree more with Mr Smith.
Today I was especially remembering a now passed friend and inspiration, who did survive that day, and beyond.
RIP Louis Alfred Glover, gone, but not forgotten.
I saw something on ABINGDON on fb that The Nags Head is being sold? Anyone heard anymore?
The Nags Head is listed on RightMove but so was the
Old Anchor Inn.
Fake News maybe !
I’d like to vote with enthusiasm, but when the voting system means that MPs end up being more beholden to their party organization than the electorate (of all stripes) who voted for them then something is wrong. Then voting seems to make you complicit in an unsavoury system which rewards the self-interested rather than the altruistic.
One hopes that MPs who appear more wrapped-up in their party careers than the wider interests of their electorate have their tickets to play in the ‘game’ withdrawn at the ballot-box where true influence should lie.
Well, The Nag’s is up for sale …
Perhaps we could persuade Dusty to take over the TC and make something of the town as they and the BID don’t seem to have a clue.
Dusty?
AKA Dushan, owner of the Nags Head.
It’s a shame he’s moving on from the Nag’s but maybe there’s a new challenge beckoning… I wonder if it’s a riverside hotel/restaurant?
Somewhere adjacent perhaps … one can only hope, Badger
The Nag’s Head is being sold by the owner. Dusty is a tenant, in fact, a sub-tenant. I suspect that now he has made a go of it the rent will go up. Seems an odd way to carry on but that seems to be how it works.