Unusual to see Carole King and Cheryl Gillan in the same article (Chiltern Liberal Democrats)

Chiltern Liberal Democrats <info@chilternlibdems.org.uk>

Unusual to see Carole King and Cheryl Gillan in the same article

January 16, 2012 9:45 PM
By Peter Jones

Let us start with an apology. In fact, two apologies. One is that this website doesn't like personality politics, it especially doesn't like to attack individuals on a personal basis. So if what follows reads like a personal attack, it isn't supposed to.

Secondly, there is an elephant in the room here which needs to be confronted. Yes, we in the Liberal Democrats know about about election pledges and the breaking of them. We fouled up badly on tuition fees, and have been (not surprisingly) punished by the electorate.

With that out of the way, here's a part of the speech made by Cllr Peter Jones, the Group Leader of the Chiltern DC Liberal Democrats at council, Tuesday 10th January. Note, that's the day the HS2 decision was announced and before the news about Ms Gillan's house sale in Old Amersham became known.

Peter said

" I was at a meeting in Great Missenden this lunchtime. All the people locally who had worked on the campaign were being applauded. Except when Ms Gillan's name came up, there was an embarrassed silence. For one cheap round of applause before a general election she was gong to win anyway, Ms Gillan has lost any political credibility that she may have had. It doesn't really matter any more whether she resigns or not. But we all know - or at least it is widely rumoured - that she will not be contesting the 2015 election. The Conservative Party should select a new, anti-HS2 ppc (prospective parliamentary candidate) immediately. That would be a boost to the campaign, and I call upon them to do so'. "

So our position on the key issues of the day is:

HS2? We continue to oppose the proposals locally. This is not because we live in the Chilterns and don't want it near us. It's because we live in the Chilterns and have therefore looked at the details. And the details of the business plan for HS2 remain flawed.

Cheryl Gillan resigning from the cabinet? A Carole King sang "it's too late baby, now, it's too late". It matters not now whether she stays as Welsh Secretary or not. The decision on HS2 has been taken. Given that she promised to resign and fight HS2 from the back benches (*) the time to have done that was a year ago. In fact, even better, when the call came from Mr Cameron "Cheryl I want you to be in the Cabinet" she should have turned it down then.

(* Ms Gillan will probably claim, sooner or later, that she was opposing the route, not the principle, and continues to do so. If so that's just NIMBY and it won't do any good).