Paul Crossley

Congratulations to Nick Clegg on winning the Liberal Democrat Leadership contest. Again my vote went to the second placed candidate (as it has with every leadership election since the party was formed !!). I think the closeness of the vote is a fair reflection on the support across the the country. Now we must all work together and get on with the job of winning trust and votes. The Tories will doubtless use the closeness of the election as an excuse to say we are split and Nick does not have a mandate. We are not split, we just like to exercise our vote and Nick has a clear mandate because we will all unite behind the new leader. The Tories are again facing corruption scandals and here in Bath they are wasting money of Logo changes whilst planning to milk B&B small business with exhorbitant parking rises. Not only that, despite lying about our waste collection plans in the elections - they said we were going fortnightly on residual household waste - which we had absolutely no plans for at all - and despite the fact that our Council has adopted a Zero Waste strategy they are now flirting with a mass burn incinerator option. If that goes ahead there will be growing protest - and the money wasted will probably be used as the excuse for not introducing the planned cooked food waste collection of next Spring.

At the Plymouth hustings for the leadership elections both candidates signed our Save Cadburys at Keynsham petition. So our new leader already has his first policy position for our Council area. Chocolate manufaturing for the UK market should remain based in the UK with a plant at Keynsham. Picture shows Nick with Cllr Keith Kirwan.

What a GREAT week for cycling. Well done to Two Tunnels in Bath and Sustrans across the country. Naturally I voted in the peoples millions for the Connect2 sustrans project. Here in Bath our part of the scheme is a fabulous project to bring to life two old rail tunnels and connect the centre of Bath to Tucking Mill and beyond. The Combe Down Tunnel will be really long with artistic lighting. It will be sensational. After my last entry on this I got several people query whether this would be safe. Well the answer is yes. Sustrans have other tunnels and they operate safely and are well used and popular. Cycling and walking options are, I believe really important to our future both for health and also to give us all options as oil runs out. And in addition it will be fantastic to cycle to the other side of Combe Down without having to ascend the dreaded Brasnocker Hill!!!

Our Learning Difficulties Partnership met for the first time using co-chairing. I will be co-chairing for the coming year with Nigel and the first meeting went very well with the agenda items shared between us. We spent a lot of time discussing a new report prepared by a local Bath person on people with disabilities being valued in public. People with disabilities have the worst unemployment of any section of our community and with support and will many are able to be good employees. We also started our consultation on the new update of Valuing People.

The annual Bath Spa University Christmas Carol service was again great. It was nice to see the Abbey jam packed with young people enjoying the carols and seeing their friends perform. As in previous years the concert had two commissioned works from current students both excellant but I particularly enjoyed the first which was a single phrase turned into a multi part round.

Transition Towns are a new phenominum springing up around the country. They are a grass roots activist led movement and here in Bath we now have our group under way. We held the second meeting and have agreed a vision statement and a plan of action, opened a bank acount, commissioned a web and are on the journey. Transition is about communities adjusting to life in the future in a post cheap oil world. It is essentially an optimistic viewpoint that we can adjust to the changes that will be forced on us as a consequence of our carbon profligacy over the last 200 years. And isnt it great that in Bali everyone signed up in the end to at least a basic deal. Europe should now get on and lead and set the pace. There is no point going at the speed of the slowest (USA till at least Bush goes) and within that our own Government should stop dragging its feet.

And finally ---- well I could not resist a bit on Bath 59 Albi 15 - in the European cup. Bath had an electric opening scoring two tries in two minutes. The next 65 minutes were fairly equal and then in the final 13 minutes Bath let rip with four tries. Despite the cold we all left with a warm glow. Bath are firing well in the Premiership and in Europe and looking good for a trophy in the European Cup I think.

Saturday 8th - along with over 500 people I marched round Keynsham in the pouring rain to protest at the proposed closure by Cadburys of their Keynsham Factory. Picture below is at the site on an earlier visit.

Cadburys are proposing to move the production to a factory in Poland. This is not to serve new markets but to produce products for the UK market. So its merely a cost cutting move to generate more profit. It dishes a workforce that have served the company well for many decades and will do harm to the town itself. It is a move that also flies in the face of so called ethical employment practice and principles. In these days of global warming it cannot be argued to be good for the planet to ship each bar of chocolate an additional few thousand miles. Picture below is me with a few of the Liberal Democrats from Keynsham and Bath braving the rain to let the company know what we think of their decision and calling on them to change their minds. The Rally was addressed by Cllr Keith Kirwan for the Liberal Democrats (The tall guy with the beard.). As can be seen from the banners the workers at Keynsham are siupported by their colleagues from Bourneville. The campaign is also getting a lot of support and coverage from the Bristol Evening Post.

The leadership election between Chris Huhne and Nick Clegg has been good for the party. Two top class candidates and a hard choice to make.

So this morning I finally made up my mind and put my vote to Chris Huhne.

In the last leadership election I pitched in publically for Chris as I thought he was the contender in the bunch. Really this is the contest we should have had last time. Two sharp minds, two great candidates, two different styles. Each candidate has different strengths and I found it very difficult to choose. I have met them both in Bath and elsewhere and am impressed by them both. Either will be a great leader for the party.

So what made the difference for me? Well it was marginal, but in the end as an environmental activist since the age of 14 in 1969, it was Chris's commitment and strong espousal of the environmental agenda that swung my vote his way.