JULIA SILVESTER

Labour have failed us on bins, failed us on roads, and failed us on community facilities.

The Tories have only ever propped up Labour in the town hall. The Tory candidate for Westhoughton North thinks Chew Moor is called ‘Chew Valley’ and the Tory candidate for Westhoughton South lives MILES AWAY in Astley Bridge.

Julia Silvester (South) and Derek Gradwell (North) are your local, Liberal Democrat candidates.

Julia has represented you since 2002 as your councillor, and Derek has represented you before. They are the local choice in this election.

Joining Julia and Derek is Jackie Pearcey, the woman fighting for a fresh new start for Bolton West. She wants to be an MP who really puts Westhoughton’s interests first when it comes to the national debate.

So today, Thursday 6th May, the choice is clear…

WESTHOUGHTON SOUTH – JULIA SILVESTER – X

WESTHOUGHTON NORTH & CHEW MOOR – DEREK GRADWELL – X

BOLTON WEST – JULIA SILVESTER – X

Vince Cable was crowned “King Vince” by The Guardian, after the Westminster village and Twitter was rife with comment about just how good his performance was.

The Guardian said: “Cable’s performance tonight shows that the Lib Dems are going to be a powerful force in this election campaign.”

He has topped a number of polls rating the three performances and the event, hosted by Channel 4, was seen as a precursor to the Leaders’ Debates which are to take place when Gordon Brown calls the election.

They believe it is unfair that is it based on the value of your property. They support the Liberal Democrat proposal to AXE council tax for good and replace it with a fairer, local income tax – based on your ability to pay. It would bring thousands of people out of tax completely, and many more would see their bill cut.

Image supplied by Ordnance Survey Election Maps Service. Image reproduced with the permission of Ordnance Survey. © Crown Copyright 2010

You have said it yourself, and you know it’s true – Westhoughton is forgotten.

Hundreds of residents from our hard-working community have got in touch with JULIA SILVESTER – the councillor fighting for a better deal for everyone who lives in Westhoughton South ward.

Councillor Julia Silvester

Julia conducted a survey of the community and the results are still flooding in.

Julia’s work is supported by fellow councillor David Wilkinson.

Locally-based Julia says that 2010 is the time for a real change if you are fed up with our area being treated second-rate.

Julia said: “This year is our chance to make a real difference. I know our area very well and I know the issues we are all facing together. I want to do something about it.” But Julia and David are not alone in their fight for our area.

They are joined by JACKIE PEARCEY who wants to represent you in Parliament. She’s tired of greedy MPs and fed up with Labour backing bankers and not the people.

Jackie said: “This year will be crucial. If you really want to boot Labour out of their cushy halls of power for good, then a vote for the Lib Dems is needed.”

“The Lib Dems are the only party to make such a strong commitment to wiping out the dirty politics we have all seen before our eyes.”

Jackie Pearcey is our Parliamentary Candidate for Bolton West.

The article which appeared in The Times

Nick Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats, yesterday made it clear that it is up to the people of Britain to decide who will govern the next Parliament, and not for the Labour and Tory parties to start discussing who will back who if there is a hung parliament.

The Tories and Labour have recently lavished praise on the Lib Dem leader, Clegg, in an attempt to woo the party into a potential ‘coalition’ if a majority mandate is not provided after the election.

Nick Clegg writes…

If there is a hung Parliament there will be no under-the-counter deals with either big party.

Hostilities have started. The frenzied announcements and counter-announcements from the Conservative and Labour parties over the past few days point towards a long, grinding election campaign.

Much of what we have heard so far is unsurprising: absurd pledges on spending, vitriolic attacks on cuts.

But one development is new: both the old parties now claim to be almost identical to the Liberal Democrats. David Cameron and Gordon Brown are ostentatiously flirting with Liberal Democrat voters, clumsily trying to woo them — and by implication me and my fellow Liberal Democrat MPs.

This year’s general election is likely to be the most open and unpredictable in a generation. So you have a right to know where we stand. I can promise voters wondering whether to put an “X” against the Liberal Democrats that there are no backroom deals or under-the-counter “understandings” with either of the other two parties.

The stance the Liberal Democrats will take matters more than ever because the map of British politics is being dramatically redrawn. Slowly but surely three-party politics has asserted itself. Half a century ago only 2 per cent of voters chose a party other than Labour or the Conservatives. At last year’s local elections, that had shot up to 40 per cent. At the last general election, one in four people who voted supported the Liberal Democrats; six million voters, more than for any other Liberal party in Europe.

So no wonder that both Mr Brown and Mr Cameron are trying to appeal to the millions of people who have long tired of the pendulum politics of Westminster. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so it’s a compliment of sorts that the core values of the Liberal Democrats — fairness in society, real change in politics — are now being mimicked by others. On so many issues in recent years, Liberal Democrat instincts have been in tune with the British public: on Iraq, civil liberties, political reform, the environment, fair taxes, the excesses of the City of London, the rights of Gurkha veterans.

We are, and have shown ourselves to be, very different from the other two parties. My message to Mr Brown and Mr Cameron is simple: the Liberal Democrats are up for real change. We are not up for sale.
Mr Brown and Mr Cameron utter fine words about reform and fairness, but their policies aren’t even close to what’s needed. They both say that tax should be fair, but Mr Brown has created a tax system where the poorest pay a higher proportion of their income in taxes than the rich, while Mr Cameron’s top priority is tax cuts for millionaires.

But Britain faces economic, social, political and environmental crises on an extraordinary scale. So we need an extraordinary government, not more of the same, for these extraordinary times. In the event of a hung Parliament, the British people also deserve to know how the Liberal Democrats will respond. We have two basic principles that I will uphold.

One, we will respect the will of the public. The voters are in charge and the decision is theirs. If voters decide that no party deserves an overall majority, then self-evidently the party with the strongest mandate will have a moral right to be the first to seek to govern on its own or, if it chooses, to seek alliances with other parties.

Two, regardless of the post-election arithmetic or whatever power we are granted, there are four objectives that we will unwaveringly pursue.

First: fair taxes. Our plan would mean that the first £10,000 you earn would be free of income tax. This would be paid for by taxing income and capital at the same rate, phasing out special pension subsidies for highest-rate earners, switching tax from income to pollution and introducing a mansion tax on the value of homes above £2 million.

Second: a fair start for all our children. We will cut class sizes and provide more one-to-one tuition to children by introducing a new “pupil premium” in our schools.

Third: a fair and sustainable economy that creates jobs. We will use the money from one year’s cuts in current spending to create tens of thousands of new jobs in public transport, a national programme of home insulation and new social housing. We will be honest about where savings must be made to balance the books and we will break up the banking system.

And finally, fair, clean and local politics. We will introduce a fair voting system, ensure that MPs can be sacked by their constituents if they break the rules, return powers to local communities and stop tax avoiders from standing for Parliament, sitting in the House of Lords or donating to political parties.

While the other parties set out increasingly implausible lists of promises, the Liberal Democrats will remain focused on this short list of big, structural changes that will make Britain fairer. Neither of the other parties seems willing or capable of delivering them. So the Liberal Democrat message to the voters is clear: if you like what we offer, vote for it. The decision is in your hands.

By Nick Clegg, published in The Times on Tuesday, 5th January 2010.

The new-look national website

The national Liberal Democrats have relaunched their website today.

You can check out the new-look site at www.libdems.org.uk.

Chris Fox, Chief Executive of the Liberal Democrats, said: “We’ve focused on finding out what the people who use our website want, and how we can make it easy to get it to them. The result is a big step forward.”

At the same time, Bolton Liberal Democrats have launched their new website too.

Nick Clegg, Leader of the Lib Dems

Liberal Democrats are celebrating a fantastic new win, after Dave Hodgson was elected as Mayor of Bedford.

Leader of the party, Nick Clegg, commented: “A couple of hours ago Bedford elected a new Mayor – Liberal Democrat Dave Hodgson. This is a sensational victory for Dave Hodgson and I congratulate him and the Bedford Liberal Democrats for an outstanding campaign.”

“You might not have seen much about this election in the media – but this by-election matters. The Mayor of Bedford represents more people than an MP does, and Dave will be making important decisions that affect the lives of the people of Bedford.”

“This result shows how misplaced the Conservatives’ complacency about the next election really is. The Liberal Democrats have never taken a single vote for granted. With Labour lagging behind at a disastrous fifth this is yet more evidence that the real choice is now between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats.”

“I’ve just recorded this video to congratulate Dave Hodgson, our new Mayor of Bedford.”

VIDEO: Nick Clegg on Dave Hodgson’s sensational win

Nick Clegg, Leader of the Liberal Democrats

This Saturday the Liberal Democrats will be returning to Bournemouth for what will be our last Autumn conference before the General Election.

We will be making it clear that if people want things to be different, really different, they should choose the party that is different – our Party, the Liberal Democrats.

There’s only one party that will cut taxes for ordinary people, paid for by closing loopholes for the very rich. Only one party that will make sure every child gets the best start at school in a class of just 15. Only one party that will make the changes that are needed to stop climate change before it’s too late. And only one party that will reform our broken politics. It’s our party.

That will be the message of our conference.

You can get involved by following conference online here: www.libdems.org.uk/ConferenceOnline

We’ll be keeping our Conference Online page updated every day with news and information.