BEDFORD UNITARY ELECTIONS JUNE 2009

LYNNE'S ELECTION CAMPAIGN TEAM WORKING IN WILSTEAD

Bedford Borough Council became a Unitary Council on 1 April 2009 but will retain its 54 Borough Councillors until Thursday 4 June 2009, when 36 Unitary Councillors will be elected to lead the new Council.

As the local Councillor for Elstow and Wilstead I keep in contact with residents via my Blog, emails, advice surgeries, newsletters and attendance at village events. Tonight I was persuaded to join Twitter as another modern way of communicating with voters of all ages.

Today I delivered 900 leaflets in the rain in Wilstead, ably assisted by my strong Campaign Team which includes four fellow Conservative Councillors - Mollie Foster, Peter Hand, Andrew McConnell and Jas Parmar. Afterwards we all enjoyed a well earned lunch in the newly refurbished Red Lion Pub, Elstow which provides an
excellent, fairly priced meal and good service.

With 2,100 leaflets to deliver I rely on a team of voluntary helpers in Elstow and Wilstead. The official Election Campaign starts soon and there will be a lot of hard work to prepare and distribute leaflets and canvass local residents.

During the 2007 Borough Election Campaign my team and I delivered 20,000 leaflets and won my 8th Election Campaign, so let's hope June will bring the 9th success!

THE RED LION ELSTOW and THE NHS

Elstow village has two fine pubs, The Swan, a traditional village pub and The Red Lion, which has just been refurbished by its new owners Mitchells & Butlers and reopened this week with a new Manager Edward White. On Sunday customers and local residents were invited to sample the new menu and I enjoyed an excellent and fairly priced Sunday lunch. It was a brief relaxation before a very busy week.

On Monday I chaired my last Borough Council Corporate & Resource Committee, and on Tuesday attended a BEAR Seminar about the Countywide Waste Management strategy after a school governors meeting and before an evening update on the new Bedford Academy, which John Bunyan Upper School becomes in September 2009.

On Wednesday and Thursday I had regional meetings in Cambridge and chaired my final County Council Redundancy Panel and on Friday had an Employment Tribunal in Watford, so I seemed to do a lot of driving around this week. In between meetings and dealing with various resident issues and numerous emails I managed to fit in 3 visits to my Fitness Club and two medical appointments.

On Tuesday it was my 3 yearly breast screening and on Friday I had an emergency dental appointment to replace a crown which fell out of my mouth when I was chewing an Opal Fruit sweet! My wonderful NHS dentist is a white South African who came to the UK 16 years ago and I travel 20 miles to see him because he is such an excellent dentist. This time I saw his colleague, another South African who is equally good. Many people complain about the NHS but I have only ever experienced excellent service from NHS doctors, surgeons, dentists, physiotherapists and nurses, especially in 2006/7 when I had 3 operations in Bedford and Cambridge within a year.

On Friday evening I met Hannah Miles, the Masterchef Finalist who runs a popoular Blog called Hannahscountrykitchen which attracts 150,000 hits a month. Hannah is a shipping lawyer with a passion for cooking, especially patries and desserts and lives in Podington, a small village on the edge of North Bedfordshire. Hannah gave a talk and a cookery demonstration to an audience of 100+ enthusiastic Conservatives. She charmed us all and made a delicious Toblerone Tiramisu, which takes only 30 minutes to prepare, a Lime and Ginger cheesecake and a delicious rose flavoured summer punch.