On Monday 16th February the Bridgwater Credit Union at Victoria Park Community Centre hosted a Husting for the forthcoming election. All the political candidates were present…… apart from the sitting MP, who was ‘going to send an email’ , but didn’t.
Mr Liddle-Graingers main rival for the Bridgwater and West Somerset seat, the Labour Candidate Mick Lerry, was able to explain to the audience, what Labour would do if the party won the election:
- Introduce a new levy on payday lenders and use the funds raised to boost low cost alternatives like credit unions.
- Increase the National Minimum Wage to £8 an hour before the end of the Parliament.
- Give Local Authorities a role in enforcing the National Minimum Wage.
- Ban exploitative zero hour contracts so that if you work regular hours you get a regular contract.
- Abolish the loophole that allows firms to pay agency workers less than permanent staff.
- Introduce a compulsory bonus tax, to provide a paid starter job for every young person unemployed for over a year.
- Abolish the cruel, costly and failing Bedroom Tax.
- Allow councils that make savings in the Housing Benefit bill to recycle them into building homes.
- Cut business rates in 2015, then freeze them in 2016 for over 1.5 million businessesilli0 billion of funding and give control over the full
- Devolve 30 Billion of Funding and give control over to the full revenue from the growth in business rates to powerhouse economic regions so they can back local growth.
- Create a million new high technology, green jobs by 2025.
- Freeze energy bills until 2017.
- Fix the broken energy market, increasing competition and transparency.
“Labour’s Mick Lerry -the candidate best placed to kick out Mr Lidell -Grainger”
We also need to take the railways, including the train leasing companies, back into public ownership and repeal all the tories anti trade union legislation so that trade unions memberships can effectively fight for a better deal for workers.