My family and I came to Hinchley Wood over 20 years ago and have always found this a happy place to live.

Full statement

I want to help keep it that way, along with Long Ditton and Weston Green, in our part of Surrey. Our communities face increasing pressures due to tightened council budgets and over-scaled housing developments and, if elected, I aim to ensure these are not allowed to degrade our neighbourhoods. Our homes are much more than a roof over our heads. We need schools, shops, and surgeries. We need water supplied, waste collected, decent roads and transport.

We need recreation and we need green space, and that is coming under increasing pressure. I shall continue the fight to retain our Green Belt, especially that separating Surrey from London. I want the new East Surrey Council to be effective for residents from the start, and to ensure that the proposals for promoting local democracy are much more than a gesture.

Local politics should be conducted by local people for their local residents, not by national parties with their national policies, which belong at national level. We are not Westminster’s nursery. Residents’ groups answer only to their own residents and have been a strong force in local government across Surrey since the 1930s. I look forward to continuing that proud tradition.

For this I hope to have your support on 7th May.