Liberal Democrat Councillor Wendy Rider was, last night, elected Deputy Speaker of Bedford Borough Council at the Annual Council Meeting on Wednesday evening (2nd May). The meeting also saw Cllr Wendy Rider elected as Deputy Speaker.
Wendy said "I am delighted to be elected to this position. It is a great privilege and honour to serve the Bedford in this capacity."
The Windrush Generation are British citizens. People who've lived here for decades - working, raising families, part of Britain. How they have been treated by the Home Office is brutal and cruel.
The Windrush scandal has exposed the brutality of the Home Office and the Conservatives more clearly than a multitude of other immigration and asylum scandals.
Liberal Democrat County Councillors have unanimously backed an all party motion condemning the problems caused to travellers in Hertfordshire by train companies, Network Rail and the Department of Transport. The County Council agreed to tell them all that they are failing to look after the interests of Hertfordshire residents and businesses.
The EU has leapt ahead of the UK in the pursuit of free trade deals with Australia and New Zealand after member states gave the green light for talks to start within weeks.
Figures out today reveal that 5008 streetlights are not working in Essex, and are taking an average of 33 days to fix. The figures were uncovered by the Liberal Democrat group. Essex County Council says that the majority of the faults were related to lamps or the control systems.
Commented Essex Liberal Democrat Councillor Stephen Robinson, "It's bad enough that 75% of Essex street lights are off at night, but too many that are supposed to be on are not."
The first week day of the drastically re-written rail timetables was filled was filled with delays and cancellations, as Bedford's downgraded rail service got off to a chaotic start on Monday.
Mayor Dave Hodgson went to Bedford station before 7:30am to talk to commuters about the introduction of the changes, and was back there during the evening rush hour, as the list of cancellations and delays grew on the day that the government's removal of peak-time intercity trains from Bedford took effect.
Congratulations to all the very many Liberal Democrats who stood for local council seats this month.
Local democracy relies on those who put themselves forward to represent residents, so whether you won or not, I hope you will be proud of having stood.
As a party, we saw results greatly exceeding expectations, with a big net gain of 75 councillors and four new councils under Liberal Democrat majority control.
We're looking for members for two new policy working groups: one on health and social care and one on climate change.
Do you have expert knowledge of the healthcare system? Of social care? Or climate change and energy policy?
If so there is an opportunity to help set the direction of party policy on these issues by joining a policy working groups. The party's Federal Policy Committee is launching two new working groups: a Health and Social Care working group and a Climate Change and the Low Carbon Environment working group.
I've been blown away by the thousands of people who have joined the campaign to ban upskirting so far.
Together, I know we can achieve a change in the law.
Two weeks ago at Prime Minister's, Questions the Prime Minister said the Government were considering supporting my bill ban upskirting. We need to make sure her warm words are backed up with action
Mayor Dave Hodgson has welcomed the news that the maximum stake for fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) 'gaming machines' will be cut from £100 to £2 under new rules announced by the government.
Currently, people can bet up to £100 every 20 seconds on electronic casino games on the machines, such as roulette. A cross party campaign over recent years has highlighted the harm that the ease and the speed with which people can lose money does to communities, and the Government this week responded with the announcement of plans for the cut in the maximum stake.
