Vince Cable once again shows why he should be the next chancellor.

I watched with interest the chancellor debates on Sky News and, although I agree with Sky News' that were no knock out blows, what was obvious was ....

1. The only person who had the foresight to spot the recession before it happened was Vince Cable.
2. The only person being honest across all the issues was Vince Cable.
3. The only person who will balance the ever widening gap between rich and poor was Vince Cable.

Sky News said, "Mr Cable appeared to come out on top, the public saying he put in the best performance."

The Mirror (a Labour paper) rated Vince Cable better than Alistair Darling with a 4 rosette rating compared to Darling’s 3.

And according to Channel 4 news Cable is public choice for chancellor.

It is also obvious to me and to so many of the people I talk to that Vince Cable is the best man for the job of chancellor.

So let's hope the sake of this country that he gets the job!

Our commitment to public transport.

As a Liberal Democrat I am totally committed to improving our public transport. It is my belief that central to this is a network of fast rail links between major cities and towns and branch lines into as many small towns as possible. This network would provide a greener and more efficient way of getting passengers and freight around the country.

"All well and good", you may say, "if it was cheaper", well this is exactly what the Liberal Democrats have announced today. We have promised that we will scrap the current formula used by government to determine rail fares, a move that will mean cheaper rail fares for all.

Our key promise is to scrap the current fares formula used by the Government to set the cost of travel for commuters.

Norman Baker, the party's transport spokesman, has also promised passengers who are forced to take replacement buses will get a third of their fare refunded as compensation.

“It is time the Government stopped this train fares escalator that is so unfair on passengers," Mr Baker said.

“Labour has deliberately pushed up rail fares above inflation while the cost of driving and flying has come down."

Earlier this year a Liberal Democrat study showed Britain had the most expensive railway in Europe.

Its research showed that £10 bought a British passenger 23.8 miles of rail travel compared with 35.4 in Germany, 50 in the Netherlands, 59.1 in France and a staggering 391 in Bulgaria.

“Passengers crammed onto commuter trains have been forced to pay inflation-busting fares year after year while train companies rake in multi-million pound profits," said Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat leader. "It's time for passengers to come first."

It really is time for a change of government, a real change. Don't vote for the same old worn and tired Labour policies or the carefully glossed over and airbrushed policies of the Conservatives.

Vote for a real change.

Vote for the Liberal Democrats.

A dishonest budget

Alistair Darling's sums are already being questioned.

This budget raises more questions than answers about the choices available to voters at the next General Election. Neither Labour or the Tories are being honest about what they will do if they form the next government and to add insult to injury Darling has also sneaked through another tax rise by freezing personal allowances, something spotted immediately by Nick Clegg but spotted later by the Tories [ they were never quick on the uptake ;-) ].

This £50 a year extra burden for the average tax payer when compared to Liberal Democrat plans to increase the allowance to £10,000, taking millions out of tax altogether and making many more £700 a year better off, shows how far away from being the party of the working man that this Labour government has come.

The Liberal Democrats are the party of social justice and honesty on both our financial position and on cleaning up politics.

We are offering a clear alternative to Labour and the Tories.

A vote for change would be a vote for the Liberal Democrats.

Something positive for Gosport.

With all the negativity around in Gosport at the moment, the fall out from the duck house saga, people feeling powerless to do anything about a situation that has made them very angry, I was very pleased to hear a about an idea to get the Olympic Torch to come through Gosport.

Something positive for Gosport.

This is a brilliant idea, I give it my full support and applaud all of those who are trying to make it happen. All too often I hear people anti-this and anti-that, this is a good chance for everyone in Gosport to be pro-something.

Let's get the Olympic Torch to come through Gosport in 2012!

Let's put Gosport on the map for the RIGHT reasons!

Police unable to attend - a story I hear all too often.

This story from The News highlights a major issue for most people, not just in Gosport. Although in Gosport we do seem to have more than our fair share.

Ghost-hunting museum trip reveals night thefts

The level of police cover in Gosport is just not sufficient, add to that the fact that the police cells have been closed during the week in Gosport Police Station meaning that any arrest at this time also incurs a trip to Fareham and it all adds up to criminals getting away.

Most people I speak to have a story about a similar incident, police attending sometimes days after a crime has been reported, meaning that not only have the criminals got away but any evidence left behind is contaminated.

Minor offences are often not even investigated, even when it quite clear who the perpetrators are. The amount of paper work required to process them means that it is not worth the time spent.

Don't get me wrong, I am not blaming the police for this, it is not the police that is at fault, it is the government, the police are doing a good job under the circumstances, but they are being stretched to the limits by a government obsessed with data gathering, paperwork, and bureaucracy.

The Liberal Democrats have a policy of clearly defined measures that will allow us to put more police on the street.

The Liberal democrats are leading the way on the issues!

Why not let them lead the country?

Lib Dem bank tax plan is clear and specific. Beware of copies!

I hear on the the news today that David Cameron has said the Conservatives would impose a tax on banks to repay the billions used to bail out financial institutions, claiming it is "fair and necessary", but he has not disclosed details of the proposal.

The Liberal Democrats have been very specific about how this crucial issue should be tackled, after extensive discussion with the City and others, and it is seriously worrying that both the Conservatives and the Government still do not seem to have worked out a specific proposal - long after the bank collapse and only a few weeks from an election.

Why bother with the other parties?

The Liberal democrats are leading the way on the issues!

Why not let them lead the country?

Putting money back in your pocket

Almost everyone I know has found life tough over the last year or so.

Now more than ever people need more money in their pockets to help them get by. But there’s no sign of that coming from this tired Labour Government. Instead we have the prospect of paying more and more while getting less and less in return.

No wonder people want a change.

There’s little hope of help from the Conservatives either. The top Conservative priority on tax is to cut taxes for millionaires! But if you’re not a millionaire, you won’t get an extra penny.

Only the Liberal Democrats are offering something different - real change and fairness.

Our tax plan, launched by Nick Clegg and Vince Cable, will provide real help for you. We will make the first £10,000 you earn free from tax. If you earn less than £10,000 you will pay no tax at all. If you earn more, than you will still be £700 a year better off.

Sounds great doesn’t it? And what’s even better, it can be paid for by making tax fairer.

It’s time that the very rich started to pay their fair share. By closing tax loopholes exploited by the super rich, taxes on pollution and by introducing a new ‘mansion tax’ on homes that are worth over £2million, we can give everyone a tax cut.

That’s fairer taxes - ordinary people paying a bit less, while the very rich pay a bit more.

It’s through commonsense measures like this that Liberal Democrats will bring real change to Britain. To find out more or to give your support to our campaign, please visit our website at www.LibDems.org.uk or return the enclosed form.

Together we can get real change and get real help for LOCAL families.

This is why I believe that the Liberal Democrats policies are the only policies that make sense for Gosport.

Airbrushing policy

Caroline Dinenage is currently posting on Facebook and walking the streets saying that she has had agreement that the decision to move HMS Sultan will, under a Conservative government, be "Looked at again"!

Caroline, it is not the airbrushing of your poster that concerns me!

It's the airbrushing of your parties policies!

Policies that will undoubtedly cost this area thousands of jobs!

The move of Sultan to St Athan is one that has come from a review and rationalisation of its operations by the MOD.

The Conservative parties immediate and wide ranging "Defence Spending Review" will almost certainly be asking for these efficiencies to be continued and will probably under the sweeping cuts promised by David Cameron be asking for them to be more wide spread.

Let's not be misled, even we do get a turn around of the decision to move Sultan it will not change the fact that we have ALREADY lost a significant number of jobs from the defence sector and the associated support industries.

Add to this the fact that the Conservatives have already said that they will look for a get out of the building of the new £3.5m aircraft carrier project, a project that supports 3,000 local jobs and it all adds up to a Conservative government spelling disaster for Gosport.

Gosport is already on the brink of economic disaster! We have two of the most deprived areas of the south here, we have the one of the lowest educational achievements in Hampshire, we have a transport system that cannot cope.

What Gosport needs is someone who is going to work to try and sort out the mess that we have been left with, not pretend it is not happening!

A Conservative government will NOT be good for Gosport.

It wasn’t last time and it wont be this time.

Liberal Democrat Spring Conference

I was at the Liberal Democrat Spring Conference over the weekend. It was good to see so many positive people, people who had a clear vision of what they wanted to achieve.

The clear message was that a Liberal Britain would be a fairer Britain and that we would need to go back to our constituencies and pass that message on to as many people as we can.

The highlight for me was Vince Cable, he is the one man that I believe that most people in the country would trust with our economy. He was the only man in Parliament to warn of the impending financial crisis.

Many of us "ordinary" folk were concerned at the levels of debt being offered us, concerned at the over inflated house prices and concerned that you could, without any real proof of income, get a mortgage that you could ill afford, but the only man who echoed those fears in Westminster was Vince Cable.

Now we are there, in a recession that Vince Cable and the Liberal Democrats predicted and it was truly inspiring to hear the man that warned of this disaster telling us in very clear terms how we were going to get out of it.

If anyone can lead Britain out of this recession it is Vince Cable, it is the Liberal Democrats.

I have been selected as Liberal Democrat PPC for Gosport.

Well it's been an interesting few months.

The whole story started just before Christmas when I was persuaded by a number of people that I should put myself forward for the post of Liberal Democrat PPC for Gosport. There were already a number of other potential candidates, some highly qualified, all vying for the opportunity to take on Sir Peter Viggers old seat, but it was felt by the local party that we needed a fresh, untarnished, local candidate for Gosport.

At this time I hadn't even been through the approval process that all potential Liberal Democrat PPC's have to go through to prove that they have the qualities needed to become a Liberal Democrat MP. The list of competencies was pretty comprehensive and the process that they had in place was designed to test these.

It was somewhat reassuring to know that the Liberal Democrat selection process was this meticulous and covered all the skills required of a succesful MP, but it was also a bit scary, especially for someone like myself who had not had to perfom under exam conditions for some years.

Needless to say that I came through the candidate approval process with a pretty good score, so much so that by the end of it I was emerging as central's preferred candidate. Well, with the local party feeling that they needed a local candidate, by the middle of February it was looking like I was favourite to get the job.

By this time Caroline Dineneage had already been selected to take over from Sir Peter Viggers as the Conservative PPC and the Labour Party had decided to go with Dr Graham Giles.

There were just a few more steps to go and I would be the Liberal Democrat candidate for Gosport in the 2010 general election, but with central's and local's recommendation it was looking to be a foregone conclusion.

It is now official, the press release has gone out and I am now the Liberal Democrat candidate for my home town of Gosport.

What happens next only time will tell, but I have decided to use this blog to document what happens from my perspective. I will update my progress as often as I can.

Rob.