Lib Dems confirm loony parking policy

Today's Cambridge News carries confirmation from the Liberal Democrats running Cambridge City Council that they remain intent upon exacerbating Cambridge's parking chaos with every new development that is permitted.

Referring to not changing the current hierarchy of road users (pedestrians > cyclists > public transport > private motorists) Cllr Clare Blair said,

I think that makes sense in Cambridge because it is a historic city which is very constrained, but we do recognise that people need to use their cars.

What we need to do is provide for people to be able to use their cars where necessary, but to use alternative modes of transport wherever possible. I see this as an opportunity to look carefully at what we are doing and see whether it suits the needs of our residents.

But this is a classic straw man. No-one ever suggested changing the relative priority of road users - the most vulnerable types must come first and be promoted.

Frankly I can see no evidence that the Lib Dems do "recognise that people need to use their cars", despite driving them themselves; they seem to have an ideological obsession that leads them to make perverse decisions like that on limiting parking for new developments when they should instead be requiring it to safeguard our future infrastructure.

She has also missed the point by focusing on the use of cars rather than the possession of cars - it is good for car usage to go down but that doesn't mean that car possession rates should go down, and if it is at the expense of those of more limited means then it probably would be a bad thing, too. When people do have them they will park them, whatever it takes - it's a shame the Lib Dems are unable to grasp this simple fact of life.

Civic Affairs Committee

The fight for transparent local government was taken up yesterday evening at Cambridge City Council's Civic Affairs Committee.

I had sought and been granted permission to film the committee meeting. Thank you to the committee chairman, Cllr Boyce.


Cambridge City Council Civic Affairs 15 November 2010 from Andrew Bower on Vimeo.

The main business of the meeting was agreeing the calendar for the year's council meetings and the outcome of a review of polling district boundaries. Top psephologist Cllr Colin Rosenstiel was in his element at this point, although fortunately we were spared a treatise on the single transferrable vote. The polling district boundary review is important to ensure that it is convenient for everyone to vote and that excessive queueing leading to people not being able to cast their votes is avoided. Some changes were agreed.

There are also knock-on implications for candidates' tellers when overlapping sets of polling numbers are in use at the same building but the chief executive made it clear that she would only consider the impact on voters, even though tellers play an important role in increasing turnout at elections.

The interesting part of the meeting, however, was a public question from Cambridge resident Richard Taylor. Mr Taylor had been influential in getting a recording protocol put in place at the city council and sought to ask why he had been singled out in being banned from filming meetings while a complaint against the council was being investigated and to offer some insights into the restrictive nature of the agreed filming protocol and how that is likely to put off broadcasters and other journalists from participating.

I fully support Mr Taylor's campaign for openness and transparency in the way that the proceedings of meetings are recorded. As he points out, the minutes often omit key factors in deliberations such as which councillor said what.

I also believe that members of the public who seek to influence public policy by addressing such meetings should be accountable for their contribution; if they wish to raise a confidential concern that can be done directly with their councillor but the determination of policy ought to be public. However, as with Mr Taylor, I was of course willing to take all direction given by the chairman of the meeting. In this case I was allowed to film public questions although Cllr Boyce kindly advised me not to for the sake of not being dragged through the courts by members of the public. As the only public speaker Mr Taylor indicated his willingness to be recorded, although having agreed a position for the camera in advance I didn't have an opportunity to pan to capture Mr Taylor's contribution visibly.

The Chief Executive's answers to Mr Taylor were not entirely satisfactory and the ruling Lib Dems had little to say on the matter although he was supported by helpful contributions from opposition councillors.

I hope that we will see more meetings recorded in future - turning up to long meetings to hear individual items is a time consuming occupation so we should find ways such as this to increase participation in local politics.

Also available: Higher bitrate Flash video download (Main - 449MB) (End - 49MB)

Local Planning Document Defective

In a rare case of them actually turning down a development Lib Dem councillors are crowing at how they appear to have 'saved' the Queen Edith pub from demolition at yesterday's South Area Committee.

Normally they hide behind the rigidness of the planning rules, the quasi-judicial planning process and their fear of the (exaggerated) cost of rejections going to appeal and being awarded to the appellant. However, in this case the Lib Dems seem to have rejected the application (10/0815/FUL).

Planning decisions currently can only be made with reference to national and local planning guidelines. The Lib Dems in Cambridge are responsibile for our own local plan but the plan is defective. It offers:

• No protection for pubs.
• Inadequate defence for Cambridge's distinct heritage and low skyline.
• A crazy rule limiting the number of parking spaces permitted per new dwelling to less than one.

This last rule is building in huge transport problems for the future, when we've got enough parking problems as it is. The new development in the station area will introduce no new parking, causing even greater problems around Rustat Road while new developments across the city are making local parking problems worse and worse all the time.

This is just the start of the problems. With 'affordable housing' quotas limiting housing for those in the middle band Cambridge is quite simply a planning disaster zone. Conservatives have been battling the Lib Dems over planning for years, both centrally and in clashes in Lib Dem-held wards like Trumpington. We won't stop holding them to account.

Meanwhile we'll see if the Queen Edith really is saved or if a new application is forthcoming or an appeal is lodged. It is frustrating when large pub companies and breweries try to argue that planning permission for housing is justified on the basis that they haven't been able to run a good business - let a smaller business or independent publican have a go!

Realism and Denial at the Guildhall

I don't think much of the way the Lib Dems run Cambridge City Council; their approach to growth, planning and transport are wrecking the city and their fortnightly bin collections, relentlessly-increasing council tax and approach to 'affordable' housing are not helpful.

But the realistic attitude towards the need to rationalise public spending they have adopted since the formation of the coalition is commendable. It's certainly a refreshing change from the fantasy economics of just a penny on income tax to solve all ills that we are used to from the Liberal Democrats.

The mantle of denial about public finances is taken up by Cambridge Labour, whose budget amendments have often attracted Conservative approval in the past. Sadly today's debate on the Medium Term Strategy descended into national party political point scoring by Coleridge's new Labour councillor and other Labour councillors.

Labour councillors presented no alternatives and made no constructive suggestions for improvements to the strategy, except possibly on homelessness, but that sounded more like a scaremongering dig about changes to housing benefit.

We really do need better debate than this at the city council, and I urge Cambridge residents to support Conservative candidates at the next local elections to ensure a centre-right common sense voice on the council.

So I support the plans in the main, but would entreat the council to look afresh at all parts of spending, making sure we are only doing what benefits residents - start by dismantling apparatus focused on satisfying former government targets.

Spending review and the city council

Next Monday there will be a special full meeting of the city council to agree the council's annual revision of its four-year rolling medium term (financial) strategy.

Normally the MTS would be approved at a normal meeting of the council but the meeting on the 21st October was presumably deemed to be too soon (one day) after the HM Treasury's spending review. Also given how many politicking motions were introduced at that meeting it's probably a good thing that this important consideration wasn't dwarfed.

The council operated on cautious assumptions when devising the strategy so overall there are, fortunately, no nasty surprises for the city.

One notable assumption was that there would be no compensation for the council tax freeze, but as I expected, the original promise is being kept and the funding will be to match what would have been a 2.5% council tax increase. It would therefore be scandalous for the city council not to take advantage of that multiplier; it does seem that the Lib Dems have at last listened to sense on this one.

The budget for next year won't be set until the spring; I hope councillors can be relied upon to follow through on the council tax freeze. Of course I hope they go further and fund a reduction through councillor allowances.

On the debit side it seems that 'front-loading' of reductions to the formula grant will create a corresponding vaccuum at the beginning of the spending review period, which in the case of an indebted government and a debt-free council is probably the right way round.

Overall this review is undoubtedly the right thing for the country. If we stayed in denial of the need to eliminate the structural deficit we would just be adding more and more to the final cost of fixing the public finances. Some things will be difficult but in the long term welfare reform will be good for our society and a slimmed-down public sector will help the private sector grow.

In Cambridge I urge the ruling group to concentrate on providing good value for money. We are being freed from swathes of government targets and ring-fenced budgets and should be able to afford high quality basic services if we take a good look at what we should and shouldn't be doing. It's time for zero-based budgeting!

City Council Tax U-Turn Welcome

We tentatively welcome the news that the city council seems to be coming round to our way of thinking and is planning a council tax freeze for 2011/12.

Local Conservatives were delighted when George Osborne announced in Autumn 2008 that a Conservative government would provide for two years the funding to enable a council tax freeze for councils that keep their rises to just 2.5%. This good news was consistently rubbished by local Liberal Democrats despite Chris repeatedly calling for the city council to plan to take advantage of the offer. The county council, however, very sensibly signed up to the deal.

Unfortunately, not winning the general election outright, this pledge had to be watered down to one year only (with a second year as an aspiration), but the good news is that now the Liberal Democrats are part of the coalition they no longer feel the need to oppose it for the sake of it.

The council's medium term strategy currently in force plans for a 3.5% tax rise this year. Executive councillors agreed at a meeting on Friday to recommend a new strategy which plans for a council tax freeze this year followed by 2% increases. This is certainly an improvement and to be welcomed. The final decision on the strategy will be made by full council on 8th November and the budget and council tax levels for next year at meetings in 2011.

The new MTS slightly pessimistically assumes that the central government funding for the freeze will not be forthcoming. I was previously calling for a cut in councillor allowances to trigger this funding. If the council is looking to make the saving in other ways then I call on them also to reduce the councillor allowances by 33%. This would then enable a council tax cut of 1.25% - welcome relief to hard-pressed residents.

A new kid on the blog

While looking for sources to find out whom the local Lib Dems have selected to be the next wannabe rubber tree I stumbled across Market Division Lib Dem County Cllr Sarah Whitebread's new blog. She acknowledges Tory supremacy in the Cambridge blogosphere and says that she wants to add an 'opinion' dimension to the otherwise sterile blog action from local Lib Dems here. This is to be welcomed!

"For such a liberal city it’s a shame that the most active bloggers at the moment seem to be tories."

I did notice while browsing the new blog that Martin Land has been selected Lib Dem PPC for Huntingdon. That would be the same Land who called Cambridge 'one of the scruffiest, nastiest little towns in England' in his blog. Yes we do have a copy of that post even though you pulled it down. I'm surprised Cambridge Lib Dems want to be associated with him!

P.S. Cllr Whitebread, is Colin going to be standing in Market Ward this year?

Gritting Cambridgeshire

I've just been chatting to County Cllr John Reynolds on the phone, who as a former portfolio holder for transport was recounting detailed facts and figures about the gritting process. This is John's recent message to his constituents on the subject:

I want to update you on both the Cambridgeshire and national gritting situation and as I write this report (January 12th) the snow in our area is at last melting away but many other parts of the country are still gripped in deep snow and ice.

Cambridgeshire started the gritting season with all our four salt barns full with a total of some 12,000 tonnes, enough to do at least 60 full gritting runs which is the average number over each of the winter periods in the past 15 years. We have over the past ten years invested in 35 gritting lorries designed to the latest standards each of which can spread up to 5 tons of salt.

Salt works by turning the ice or snow surrounding each salt granule into a saline solution which has a lower freezing point than water. The action of traffic is essential for salt to be effective - moving the salt granules around and eventually meting the ice and snow.

Since 16th December we have carried out well over 40 runs, including on Christmas Day, plus undertaking a couple of secondary runs and numerous bits of spot salting on footways and cycleways. Each full gritting run uses over 200 tons of salt and covers about 42% of all county roads, the Highways Agency are responsible for the national road network.

We do have some material that is not suitable for the gritters which we are using in a targeted way to fill grit bins and to treat some of the busier footways. During this extremely cold spell we have worked with city, district and parish councils to treat as much as we can. Our teams have been working very hard, around the clock in very challenging conditions.

Nationally many areas have been harder hit than us, for example in the north and Scotland, this has meant that deliveries of replacement stocks normally destined for us have had to be redirected to those most in need. This happened last year and is a partnership between the Department for Transport, Local Government Association and salt suppliers to prioritise which authorities receive deliveries and when. Each council provides regular information on their salt stocks to help decision making.

As you know, like last year, we are seeing many potholes with many more likely to form in these extremely cold conditions. We are asking people to let us know of any problems in their area - they can notify us via our website or via the contact centre on 0345 045 5212 (contact centre is open 8.00 am-8.00 pm, Monday to Saturday). We will repair them as soon as resources and weather conditions allow.

Apparently there are a number of measurement stations across the county and information from them is combined with hourly predictions from the meteorological office to produce charts from which the decision to grit is made. The threshold for gritting is a predicted 2°C.

There is an arrangement with the city council for the city to have a daily supply of salt, which they can and do take to distribute to city centre footways as they see appropriate.

Cycling town proposed works

Some specific improvements for cycling have now been put forward by the county council for consultation as part of the cycling demonstration town works.

As a general rule I'm sceptical of splashing paint around, which is often just a way of cutting transport capacity of particular kinds for ideological purposes, but welcome genuine improvements. It looks like there's a mixture planned:

Cherry Hinton Road
Facilities for cyclists have been reviewed in detail to see what improvements could be made. Due to the relative narrowness of the road, it is not realistic to have on-road cycle lanes on both sides of the road. The proposals involve improvements to the shared use off-road cycle route.

Madingley Road
The team have been looking at improving the provision for cyclists with a combination of onroad and off-road cycle paths. From Queens Road to Storey’s Way the existing off-road shared use path will be widened. From Storey’s Way to the Park and Ride there will be a combination of on-road and off-road paths, as the width of the road varies considerably.

The Tins
Discussions are currently taking place regarding the purchase of land to widen the route on the north and/or south side. From initial survey work carried out the most likely improvement will be to the north side.

Gilbert Road
The proposal is to introduce traffic calming measures and improve the cycle lanes along Gilbert Road. There is a separate leaflet available with more details of the proposals.

There's a chance to view the plans and air views at the consultations:

Tuesday 19 January 2010 - 4.30 - 7.30pm
Cherry Hinton Village Centre, Colville Road

Wednesday 20 January - 8 - 10am and 4.30 - 7.30pm
Madingley Road Park & Ride waiting room

Thursday 21 and Monday 25 January - 4.30 - 7.30pm
Chesterton Community College Lounge, Gilbert Road

Wednesday 27 January - 4.30 - 7.30pm
Cambridge Central Library, Lion Yard (Third Floor opposite the Café)

Coleridge Conservatives are keen to know what residents think of the ideas.

Labour Government ignored grit warning

It seems that Gordon Brown and his dithering government ignored a report that could have helped prevent national grit shortages.

Conservative local government spokesman Caroline Spelman revealed this latest instance of dither.

We really do desperately need a general election - government in the UK is currently paralysed. And a Lib Dem MP in Cambridge won't help either - vote Nick Hillman!

Election night saved in Cambridge

In another victory for Conservative campaigning, election night has been saved in Cambridge. Just had this back from the Chief Executive of the City Council, Antoinette Jackson, who is the returning officer for the elections in Cambridge:


"As you will be aware the Council approved the following motion in October:

"This Council believes that the interests of democracy and the country are best served if the result of a general election is confirmed as soon as possible after the close of polls. It therefore strongly supports general election counts being conducted on election night immediately following the close of polls, and requests that the returning officer takes note of this opinion."

As Returning Officer I have now had a chance to review the arrangements for election counts with the Democratic Services Manager and electoral services staff and have undertaken a risk assessment of the risks inherent in a Thursday night count, particularly for a combined election.

I can confirm that we will go ahead with a parliamentary count on the Thursday night as in previous years. But if it is a combined election then we will not start the local election count until 1pm on the Friday afternoon. This will allow key staff to have a proper break between the two counts and to minimise risk of error due to tiredness.

If the two elections are on separate dates we will do Thursday night counts for both.

I will be writing to local election agents to advise them of this decision."


The motion to Council was proposed by myself, and was probably the first time a Conservative proposed motion has been approved at the City Council for a great many years!

Rubbish performance for Lib Dems

Richard Normington has crunched the numbers again on the Lib Dems' poor performance at recycling in Cambridge.

Conservative Huntingdonshire has extended its lead over Lib Dem Cambridge in the recycling stakes according to the latest statistics.

Despite lots of hot air on global warming being produced at the Guildhall for public consumption, the figures show a different story of how the Lib Dems have let Cambridge lose the race to recycle.

Now, some 57.2 per cent of household waste in Tory Huntingdonshire is for reuse, recycling or composting. This is compared to just 41.2 per cent for Cambridge.

The Tory authority extended its 2001 lead of one per cent to 16 percent today

This poor performance is despite the city Lib Dem insistence that fortnightly waste collections are either necessary to keep up recycling rates or to save money.

The Lib Dem arguments are nonsense (see an old press release full of bluster from the Lib Dems in the name of the relevant former executive councillor, Cllr Rosenstiel).

On recycling rates: the current advice from the city council is to use the black bin for food waste in the alternate weeks in which the green bins aren't emptied. That would no longer need to be the case if at least the green bins were emptied weekly. Better service needn't mean less recycling.

On saving money: the cost of handling non-recycled waste has increased significantly in recent years due to the government's bin taxes. Fortunately the Conservatives announced that they would pull back from Labour's punitive approach and make it easier for local authorities to collect all waste weekly if they wanted to.

New Year messages

Watch David Cameron's New Year message here:



You can sign up online to receive David Cameron's regular e-mails.

Nick Hillman, Cambridge's Conservative parliamentary spokesman, also has a New Year message. E-mail Nick at nickhillman@me.com to receive Nick's regular e-mails.

Nick Hillman hits the snow running

Last Saturday Cambridge residents selected Nick Hillman to stand for parliament for Cambridge at the next general election.

The campaign team in Coleridge agree that Nick is an excellent choice for Cambridge. You can read all about Nick on his website (www.nickhillman.co.uk) and keep up-to-date with his campaign on his regularly-updated blog.

Nick has previously lived in Cambridge while doing his teacher training and has taught at Hills Road Sixth Form College. Nick has had a varied career including teaching history, working in the pensions industry and currently as chief of staff to David Willetts MP, specialising in university policy. Nick has pledged to move back to Cambridge as soon as possible and before the new year.

During the short campaign between being shortlisted for the Cambridge open primary and being selected Nick worked hard at making contacts in the constituency and understanding the issues facing Cambridge, including visiting the city council's West/Central Area Committee.

Since selection Nick has already been to the East Area Committee, where the consequences of Ashwell going bust were discussed and today was out delivering Christmas cards to Coleridge residents.

We wish Nick well in his campaign to become Cambridge's MP. He will be building on the excellent work done by his predecessor, Richard Normington, over the last two years. Only a Conservative MP can help to kick Gordon Brown out and return a strong Conservative government to fix the broken economy and broken society!

Follow Nick on twitter or sign up to his campaign at myconservatives.com!

Last chance to sign up for the open primary!

Registration for Cambridge Conservatives' open primary to select our prospective parliamentary candidate closes at midnight tonight. Register NOW!

However you normally vote, it is in the best interests of our city for all parties to present the strongest candidate possible so if you are a city elector and you are available on Saturday morning then this is your chance to make a difference!

One week to the open primary

Cambridge Conservatives are holding an 'open primary' (caucus) to select a replacement prospective parliamentary candidate on Saturday 12 December. All registered voters in the city constituency are eligible to attend and vote but you need to sign up first.

The short list does not seem to have been published yet, so I do not know who will be in the race, but the place to be to find out the latest news seems to be Richard Normington's blog, where he is running a commentary on the process - one hopeful seems to have declared so far.

Thank you to everyone who applied to be our PPC - may the best candidate win!

UPDATE (Sunday): I have just found out that registration for the open primary closes at midnight on Wednesday. Sign up quickly!

Tribute paid to departing city MP

The city's Lib Dem MP, David Howarth, has announced that he is standing down at the next election.

Richard Normington has paid tribute to the city's MP on his blog.

Many people we speak to on the doorstep say they are impressed at the work that he does for his constituents and admire his integrity, even though they might not agree with Liberal Democrat policies.

It is now clear that there is everything to play for in Cambridge at the next general election.

Blue Bins are arriving

Hopefully most residents will now be aware of the change to blue bins - delivery of the blue bins has already begun, and should be finished by Friday 20 November. You should receive your new bin some time between those dates.

These essentially will replace the black and blue boxes, and will allow all the materials that used to go in these boxes (e.g. paper, glass containers, plastic containers) plus some additional items like clean cartons to be put in the new blue bin together for recycling.

I welcome this initiative - the City Council is some way behind the better performing Conservative Councils on recycling, and this could help - making it easier to recycle, and allowing more types of waste to be recycled.

The Council has lots of information about the new blue bins on its website here. If you have any specific questions about your blue bin, then please call the Council on 01223 458628.

As a local Councillor, I am keen to scrutinise various aspects of the scheme, such as how much it costs to run, but also how the roll-out has gone, and what lessons the Council can learn for the future. If you have any feedback on the following, please let me know:

How well informed did you feel about this change? How did you find out about it - through 'Cambridge Matters' magazine? Notices on your black bin? Leaflet through your door? or was the first you knew when the new bin turned up...

A key problem for the scheme is bin storage, particularly in streets with terraced houses. Some streets won't be given a bin at all (resident can opt-in), others will be partially opt-in. Most if not all roads in Coleridge should have a blue bin delivered by default. However, on request, the Council says it will swap your bin for boxes if you don't have space, or swap your boxes for a bin if it turns out you do have space. How is this working for you?

Finally, some additional advice about the lids on the new bins. Due to the way the bins have to be stored some of the lids will not close completely straight away. This is normal, and the lids should gradually close themselves over the course of about 2 days. If there are any bins where the lids have not righted themselves by the time the main deliveries have been completed, (i.e. around November 20th) then let the Council know, but since the bins are for clean recycling and should not contain food waste, this should not cause any issues with flies.

Richard Normington supports Cambridge at growth hustings

Richard Normington, the Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Cambridge, joined representatives of the other main parties in Cambridge for a hustings on The Politics of Cambridge's Growth organised by the Federation of Cambridge Residents' Associations on Friday night. FeCRA will be publishing a record of the meeting on their website in a number of weeks.

On the disposition of power between the government and local authorities

While Labour's candidate said the balance was "broadly right", the Green party candidate focused on getting global green targets and the leader of the city council went on about Local Income Tax, Richard said that the balance was way out in favour of the government and that the Conservatives would shift large amounts back, including giving local authorities a 'general power of competence'.

Regarding the complex arrangements for local government financing, where approximately 80% of funds come from the government, Richard say we should "start with easy steps", such as to "ease back on ring-fencing".

On growth in Cambridge

Richard Normington reaffirmed his support for the Conservative policy of scrapping the Regional Spatial Strategy and allowing local authorities to form their own judgement about housing need and provision.

To a question about housing targets the Labour spokesman said that they were "not plucked from thin air" and that they had been debated and agreed. From where I was sitting in the audience I don't think this impressed anyone!

Asked whether he could be sure, as he had stated, that "the need for growth will be accepted without being forced by the government", Richard Normington pointed out that one of the reasons that housing always seems to be unwanted is that the governments rules mean it inevitably turns out to be what isn't needed, citing numbers for the massively increased proportion of new-builds that are poky flats with no gardens.

Richard also added that the Conservatives would provide incentives for communities to agree to development by allowing them to keep the proceeds of new council tax arising from it and some other revenue streams.

Richard and the Labour candidate rejected development on the Marshall site, although the Labour candidate failed to understand that the consequence of the government's targets was that if the council doesn't get on with it the government threatens "we will set up a quango" to force it through.

The Lib Dem wanted to develop the Marshall site while the Green didn't know. (The Green city councillor appears to be in favour.)

On infrastructure

The Green Party wasn't keen on the sort of infrastructure that the other candidates were - roads and utilities - he wanted everything to be with 10 minutes' walking distance. (Nice little utopia you've got there!) Richard Normington ridiculed this sort of protectionism that starts global and ends at the village boundary.

Labour's Transport Innovation Fund congestion charging blackmail was widely derided.

All the other candidates agreed that infrastructure needed to come first or at the same time as development; the current system of post-development levies was considered inadequate.

Richard Normington was scathing of the competence of the Lib Dem city councillors, citing their failure to understand their own system with respect to section 106 agreements at a recent area committee he had attended. One of the interlocutors reported that a Lib Dem had told him "we don't know where to spend it because we don't have any open space to put it!"

It was also pointed out that the developers of the Tim Brinton site in Coleridge have tried to reduce their s.106 contributions from £1.5m to £500k.

On two practical policies for green spaces, while the Green candidate put all his hope in his controversial Wicken Fen project, Richard said that he supports local "food producers not mosquito farmers" and that verges should either be "for trees and grass or cars but not both".

Council Agrees "Save Election Night"

Cambridge City Council last night agreed to support the Conservative campaign to save election night in Cambridge. The following motion was agreed unanimously:

"This Council believes that the interests of democracy and the country are best served if the result of a general election is confirmed as soon as possible after the close of polls.

It therefore strongly supports general election counts being conducted on election night immediately following the close of polls, and requests that the returning officer takes note of this opinion."

As the only Conservative on the Council, it was very pleasing to have unanimous support for my motion - certainly the first Conservative motion to be passed at the City Council for a large number of years!

In the debate, it was pointed out that at the last general election Cambridge did not declare until 5am, and felt that in order to reduce the long hours, much more could be done to improve organisation and get the result earlier.

I will again be writing to the returning officer, the Chief Executive of the City Council, to ask if we can confirm a Thursday night count - if so, it will be interesting to see if we can be declaring at a more sensible time - I would suggest 2am at the latest...