Nothing to do with politics, but since no mainstream media could find the space to point this out, I thought I write a short blog post about my Home Office colleague David Smith and 10 of his friends who walked 30 miles from Chester to Hale in aid of The Christie.

They started the walk at some ungodly hour of Saturday morning (10th April 2010) and most of them had made it to Hale by mid-afternoon.

Even more astounding was that Christian, who is a patient himself at The Christie, successfully completed the walk.

I know the team are still suffering with their various ‘foot-related’ injuries, but I’m sure these will heal quickly and it must feel great to have raised £7,775 online + another £1,000 or so via the Gift Aid scheme.

There’s still a pot of off-line donations in the office to add to the total, so I’m confident that the final figure will be well over the £9,000 mark.

The ‘walkees’ were: Andrew Valentine,Mark Valentine,Julian Valentine,Adam Valentine,Christian Valentine,Simon Mudd,Mark Peters,Matt Roberts,Paul Gozem, Gareth Shaw and David Smith.

It’s not too late to donate (even though the walk has already been completed), you can donate on-line here: http://www.justgiving.com/chester-hale-walk

Tonight will see the final Seedley and Langworthy Trust “Salford Question Time” event at Salford Arts Theatre, just off Liverpool Street in the heart of Langworthy.

Chaired by Gerry Stone, the panelists are: Salford Lib Dem leader Councillor Norman Owen (Parliamentary Candidate for Salford & Eccles), Labour MP for Salford Hazel “chequewaver” Blears, cardboard cut-out Tory Mathew Sephton, Salford Advertiser reporter Pamela Welsh and Alex Halligan who is secretary of the Salford TUC.

It all kicks off at 7pm and it’ll be interesting to see if Hazel has bussed in her supporters to hijack the event with prepared questions or, maybe, we’ll have a balanced night with thought provoking questions from all sides of the spectrum (both political and non-political).

I’m told this isn’t a hustings (the stage wouldn’t be big enough for all the declared Salford & Eccles candidates anyway!) – but it’s still an important pre-election test for the three main party candidates.

Hope to see you there!

It seems as if (locally) Labour have started a Barchart war, the first salvo being fired by Labour councillor John Warmisham on his blog. The war has been joined by Salford Tory Iain Lindley, who has updated his own site’s header to include an equally flattering bar chart.

Allow me to retaliate with this:

We Lib Dems love bar charts  For those that are unaware, the last election in Langworthy was in 2008 when the Liberal Democrats booted out Andy Salmon, who was a Labour councillor in the area. Residents were fed up with Labour and let them know about it with a stunning victory for Langworthy Lib Dem Councillor Lynn Drake.

Let’s continue the lesson for Labour.
Boot out Labour’s candidate who lives in Broughton on May 6th by once again voting LIBERAL DEMOCRAT

Vote Steve Middleton. Your local choice.

One of my Langworthy neighbours had the misfortune to receive a Labour local election leaflet this week.

I must admit to being apalled by their brazen attempt to take credit for other people’s work, such as their ‘top story’ about improvements to the M602 roundabout, printed right underneath the headline ‘Labour working for Langworthy & Ordsall.’ This work was planned and is being funded by the North West Regional Development Agency, not Labour, not even Salford Council.

Further, the audacity to claim credit for The Bridgewater Residents Association’s and, in particular, Paul Brodie’s efforts in gaining £100K investment from the Safer Home Funds for security hardening in Irwell Riverside was particularly galling.

I know Paul quite well and campaigned alongside him and other residents as we tried to overturn Labour’s decision to re-locate a Young Offenders centre to a residential street – totally against the wishes of residents who already lived in one of the worst areas in Salford for crime.

I’m sure he will be as disgusted as I am that Langworthy & Ordsall Labour councillors are claiming credit for his hard work and efforts in their election leaflet.

Perhaps the most annoying point of all about Labour’s leaflet is that they seem to think Langworthy and Ordsall are the same! Nothing could be further from the truth!

I believe that while we should (and do) work together with our neighbours in Ordsall, decisions about Langworthy should be made in Langworthy – that’s why I would split the Ordsall & Langworthy Community Committee and have one for Ordsall and a completely seperate one for our area.

Lets stop decisions for Langworthy being made in Orsdall and Broughton. Both Langworthy’s Labour ward councillors live in Broughton – it’s my belief that a Langworthy councillor should live in Langworthy.

Langworthy Liberal Democrat Councillor Lynn Drake lives in Middlebourne Street and I live on Seedley Park Road, both in the heart of our area.

On May 6th you have two votes, one for the general and one for the local election.

For the local election, I’m appealing to you to VOTE LOCAL.

Vote Liberal Democrat.
Vote Steve Middleton.

Let’s return local politics to local people.

Apologies for the recent downtime of this website (and also the Langworthy Lib Dem micro-site and Norman Owen’s website). Following today’s announcement by Gordon Brown that the General Election will be held on Thursday 6th May – our webpages today received quadruple the average visitors we’d typically get in a week!

As such, the hosting plan that we had with our web company (Compila) was not up to the task and Compila took the webpages down until we changed to their top tier plan.

We’ve done that and now we’re back on-line

That said, it’s the right time to mention our four steps for a fairer Britain:

Fair taxes that put money back in your pocket

• The first £10,000 you earn tax-free: a tax cut of £700 for most people
• 3.6 million low earners and pensioners freed from income tax completely
• Paid for in full by closing loopholes that unfairly benefit the wealthy and polluters

A fair future creating jobs by making Britain greener

• Break up the banks and get them lending again to protect real businesses
• Honesty about the tough choices needed to cut the deficit
• Green growth and jobs that last by investing in infrastructure

A fair chance for every child

• Ensure children get the individual attention they need by cutting class sizes
• Made possible by investing £2.5 billion in schools targeted to help struggling pupils
• Give schools the freedom to make the right choices for their pupils

A fair deal by cleaning up politics

• Put trust back into politics by giving you the right to sack corrupt MPs
• Restore and protect hard-won British civil liberties with a Freedom Bill
• Overhaul Westminster completely: fair votes, an elected House of Lords, all politicians to pay full British taxes

You’ve been let down by Labour for the last 13 years. You’ve had 65 years of Labour and Conservative Governments taking it in turns to make the same old mistakes over and over again.

The choice in this election is between more of the same with Labour and the Conservatives or real change with the Liberal Democrats.

We will clean up politics. We will deliver fairness.

We will change Britain.

If you have already registered to vote – why not do it by post? I do!

I find it’s easier and more convenient to vote by post (but then I will be rather busy on polling day anyway!).

For the many people who struggle to get out and walk a fair distance, voting by post does not become a ‘chore’ – after all, after you’ve voted, someone else can post it for you!

If you would like to vote by post, you can download an application form here from the Salford Council website.

Once completed and signed, please return your form(s) to the Elections Office, Salford Civic Centre, Chorley Road, Swinton, Salford, M27 5DA.

You can vote by post for one election, for a fixed period of time (say 6 months or 1 year) or indefinately.

You choose. It’s your vote. Use it wisely.

Writing my last blog post reminded me of the bar chart we have carried on our last 3 or 4 Focus leaflets that have been delivered across the Langworthy ward during the last few months. Here’s whats printed on the top right hand corner of each one:

As you can see, Langworthy Lib Dem councillor Lynn Drake won an impressive victory at our last local elections, proving that if you live locally you’re more likely to care about our area. Both Lynn and I live in the heart of the ward, unlike Labour’s man who couldn’t care less about Langworthy. He’s proved this by closing local schools and being conspicuous by his absence.

Contract this with the Focus leaflets the Langworthy Lib Dem team have delivered in the past few months:

The above doesn’t include the Pendleton focus that has gone out to residents in the town centre.

Remember, don’t vote for Labour’s man who lives in Broughton.
Vote for local Langworthy resident Steve Middleton for the Liberal Democrats on May 6th.

I don’t normally read the Guardian (or often frequent it’s website), but I happened across this article today, which was published yesterday on the Guardian’s website.

It seems that following Vince Cable’s superb performance on the “Ask the Chancellor” Channel 4 debate, Liberal Democrat support is up at the cost of Tory and Labour support. This does not surprise me.

Most Labour and Tory supporters agree that Vince Cable would make a far better chancellor than Osbourne and, clearly, anybody could do a better job than Darling (going off his Channel 4 performance, alone.)

We Liberal Democrats are fans of pie charts and bar charts, so here’s a screen grab from the Guardian piece – I urge you to read it anyway: