Rick's St Mary's Diary

The news has been full of congestion charging stories today. My advice is not to believe everything you read, and certainly not to get carried away in the hyperbole of it all. From what I was hearing this morning, the media was carrying on as if people would be charged a fiver a day from next Tuesday! This simply isn't the case, and any charge will be many years off if it ever happens at all. The important thing to remember is that this is a decision to be made at a Greater Manchester wide level by a huge number of people and groups, as part of a long and democratically accountable process. And as your local Councillor I will make myself very heavily involved in making sure that the right thing happens in the right way. Lib Dems remain committed to greatly improving public transport as a first resort.

The impending long weekend means three days of leafleting sessions, and not a lot else unfortunately. Tam is off to Rome with her family, taking in the most romantic city in the world whilst leaving her boyfriend (me) at home. Other people I know are busy with family or away, which means I get the opportunity for some quiet time to catch up on casework and start thinking about the next edition of Focus. Aside from road-charge news (if there is any real news to report) we have successes in Prestwich Clough (flooding cleared up) and the Village (graffiti removed) to report, news about the street surgeries and lots more.

Rick