As many of you will have spotted, I have copped some flak from two local community groups over my opposition to the recent Princes Foundation request to the Secretary of State to intervene in the decision by South Hams District Council to grant flexibility to the developers of Sherford in relatio
First the good news. In my time at Westminster this is one of the first defence reviews taking place in the context of an increasing defence budget. The commitment by the Conservative government to increase defence spending by at least one billion pounds per annum is very welcome.
The House of Commons resumed this week after our three week conference recess, with a sense of “let’s just get on with it.” There has been a lot of press talk over the summer about leadership challenges and early elections, most of it pure speculation.
At PMQs today, Gary Streeter MP asked the Prime Minister for her intervention to assure the future of the Royal Navy's amphibious fleet which play a vital role in the work of the Royal Marines.
Plymouth MPs, Gary Streeter and Johnny Mercer, have written to the Secretary of State for Defence seeking urgent clarification over the rumours about the loss of the UK's amphibious capabilities and the subsequent impact on the Royal Marines in Plymouth.
It looks as though we will be spending the next few years debating once again the merits of capitalism versus socialism. Most of us thought this was a done deal; that the argument had been well and truly won in the UK and elsewhere throughout the seventies and eighties.
The headline news that Mrs Merkel was re-elected to serve a fourth term as German Chancellor was expected. But two other by-products of this poll are of some interest. She got 32.5% of the vote, well down from the 41% she got in 2013.
One of the big issues in the recent general election campaign was school funding. We were moving from an opaque formula that had grown up over the years and nobody appeared to understand to a National Funding Formula (NFF).
