Rochford & Southend East (Southend Liberal Democrats)

Southend Liberal Democrats <info@southendlibdems.co.uk>

Rochford & Southend East

Rochford & Southend East Parliamentary Candidate - Cllr Graham Longley

Graham Longley goes shopping with Vince Cable

Cllr Longley & Vince Cable with their shopping baskets

Like everyone else in the country, residents of Southend are suffering from rocketing food and energy prices. The government's own figures show that

bread is up a fifth, butter and eggs by over a third and potatoes by over a

quarter.

Local Lib Dem Parliamentary Spokesman, Cllr Graham Longley joined forces

recently with the Lib Dems' ShadowChancellor Vince Cable MP to highlight

the real increase in the cost of living - Groceries up over 25% -

They took a supermarket basket of basic groceries which together cost less than £10 last year. The same basket now costs over £12, a quarter higher.

"People are feeling the pain of the credit crunchand rocketing prices," said Cllr Graham Longley. "Thegovernment is doing too little, too late to help people get through the hard times." - Lib Dems would put money back in peoples Pockets

"We need to put money back in the pockets of people who are struggling to

make ends meet. Liberal Democrats are calling for a 4p cut in the rate of income tax, paid for by upping taxes on pollution and closing tax loopholes used by the rich.

Lib Dems would cut government waste and stop tax loopholes for the rich.

"We would also get tough on unnecessary and wasteful government spending, and use some of the money saved to cut taxes even further for those on low and middle incomes. And energy companies should be forced to use the £9 billion profit they have made from the Emissions Trading Scheme to cut bills and fight fuel poverty."

1.00.00pm UTC (GMT +0000) Mon 10th Nov 2008

Tories hide details

Cllr Graham Longley, LibDem leader on Southend Borough Council and Parliamentary spokesman for Rochford & Southend East expressed amazement at the comment from some Tory MP's to an article in Friday's Independent newspaper about David Cameron's plan to ban shadow cabinet Tories from having second jobs because he thinks that this makes them look like part time politicians.

David Cameron has come under attack from his own MPs who are reluctant to give up their lucrative other jobs, many of them saying they could not afford to live on an MP's salary of £61,000 a year and might need a top-up from Tory funds if they were told to give up their outside jobs. Of course as a cabinet member they would get even more!

In his amazement Cllr Longley said "that many people would like a job in the first place. Not only that, many people would be very happy with a salary of £61,000 plus all the perks they get, especially pensioners who struggle in many cases just to pay for their heating.

It is quite clear that many Tory MP's are out of touch with the real world and need to be realistic especially in the current financial climate. Voters elect MP's to go to parliament to represent them not to be part time members whose focus may be elsewhere with second jobs."

Cllr Longley issued a challenge to Southend's local MPs to tell the local electorate whether they were full or part time MP's and to explain why with all the expenses they get, they might feel they need more than £61,000 per year of taxpayers money.