Good infrastructure is vital to any economy, both regional and national. Maidstone, being a commuter town, relies more heavily than most on our railways. The UK, being an island, often puts more stock in air travel. But in reality our country relies on a network of transport hubs – from Dundee...
The annual London Marathon weekend is indelibly impressed upon my memory. Those who have undertaken this valiant venture will doubtless recall the anniversary of their efforts with quite some emotion, no matter how long ago they ran. The demands that this race places upon lay participants, mentally ...
A country girl at heart, my Cumbrian upbringing has engrained within me a great affection for our bountiful land. Something I had not realised fully until my more recent years, particularly upon coming to a Constituency so rich in rural and agricultural life. In the four years that I have been work...
When I was talking to Simon recently about what makes a good shopping centre he (predictably) went off on 'the theory of competing centres' and made (understandably) un-girly utterances about 'diversity of offering' and 'accessibility'. Carrie and her pals in Sex and the City would just say 'Jimmy ...
Anyone who has ever been in a 'Catch 22' situation will know the anxiety and fear of being amidst a seemingly inescapable dilemma. The charity known as Catch 22 was created to help young people who find themselves completely boxed in – be it through crime, homelessness, or poverty of aspiratio...
I wonder which words Jilly Goolden and Oz Clarke would use to describe England if our country were a wine? Complex, historic and reserved, but yet bold and forthright with notes of crustiness? In such terms the tourism marketing brains of this country have been focussed as they attempt to attract t...
As children we seek leadership and wisdom for our protection and guidance. Many of us are lucky enough to find it in our parents. And even when we grow up ourselves, their strength often remains an important foundation in our lives. As a nation we have similar needs and our unwritten constitution h...
Readers may recall my recent column concerning the drought threat facing the river Medway. An invitation to meet with the Medway Valley Countryside Partnership team last week was therefore a timely and welcome opportunity, particularly as it was at the behest of MVCP Chairman Sir Robert Worcester an...
The trouble with Statistics is that they deny emotion to the scenarios in which they are employed; 'human beings with the tears wiped off' as someone once said. And so it is with recently released numbers about pregnancy rates in the UK, where we learn good (but sterile) information about a downwar...
2001 was a rural disaster of almost biblical proportions in parts of this country. Our national news broadcast pictures of quarantined families and warzones of slaughtered carcasses being dumped by tractors onto flaming pyres. The scourge of foot and mouth took a terrible toll on communities that ye...
Warnings of drought are being heralded once again. Our own Bewl Water is pictured in the Sunday Times this week looking like a parched African landscape. A single small dinghy, with its keel balancing on acres of cracked mud, is the only watery clue in the photo. British society lacks an abstemious...
Dawn raiding Sun Journalists and Abu Qatada's curfew - just a small sample of the complex policing issues arising over the last week. The decisions and actions taken by our law enforcement officers are hugely varied and challenging. But for a long time there has been disquiet, both publicly and pri...
Question: What have the following got in common? Kent Wildlife Trust, The Holly Eatwell Trust (cancer in young people), The Giraffe Project (child education in Nairobi), The Jeremy Willson Charitable Trust (supporting projects in athletics, adventure and the environment). Yes, they are all Maidsto...
In the celebrated 1994 movie, Forrest Gump memorably said "Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get." I wonder how many of our readers have unwittingly picked a hard centre and broken a tooth on a regrettable personal relationship? More than will ever ...
Last week's column was very much about the Westminster week, Monday to Thursday. It is an intense, surreal and often rather airless environment. Thank goodness for the oxygen of constituency work. Friday surgeries in Maidstone and Cranbrook are always a highlight for me – a return to normalit...
It was back to Westminster for me last week as Parliament resumed its work after the Christmas break. I felt a noticeable shift away from domestic toward international issues - perhaps because much of our own legislation is currently in 'The Other Place', as the House of Lords is affectionately know...
It was with great interest that I went to see the movie 'The Iron Lady' this weekend. Love her or loathe her, Margaret Thatcher was undoubtedly a strong and decisive leader and I wondered how Hollywood had chosen to present such an iconic British personality. Having run the gauntlet of a Westminste...
There are a plethora of polls, surveys and reports published throughout the year making assertions or claims as an excuse to create publicity or promote sales. But sometimes the pollsters do actually hit the mark, and well done The Halifax for naming Maidstone as the UK's 8th most 'des res' in 2011...
2011 was a year of colossal change. One that will be worthy of its own chapter in the study books of students for centuries. The 'Arab Spring' was an awakening of hope that has willed literally millions of suppressed citizens to press for positive change. A seismic shift from dictatorship to democr...
How many of us have benefited from the work of a charity in the last year? The range of possibilities is diverse, including anything from Animal Welfare to Cancer Research and from the St John's Ambulance to the Samaritans. Everyone who's visited one or our museums, or perhaps found a bargain in a ...
In this column, about a year ago, I highlighted a persistent problem that always becomes more acute at Christmas time. I make no apology for returning to the subject now. Domestic violence doesn't discriminate against age, race, class or creed. It permeates every section of society and needs to be r...
One side call it sound political protest, the other says it is self-serving disruption at a time when least we need it and least we can afford it. Either way, next Wednesday could see the biggest day of strike action in the UK for a generation. The Unions are right to do their best for their member...
People in this country are disengaged with Politics. Such is the contention of many within the Party political sphere, citing poor turnout at the polls and lack of party membership as concrete evidence. They are wrong. People care enormously about the decisions that affect their lives and have much...
Rarely a week goes by without Maidstone Hospital being in the news for one reason or another. No wonder. It maintains the heartbeat of around 250,000 people in our County Town and environs. And yet it seems constantly under threat of dimunition; sometimes by blatant acts such as the transfer of our...
Before I became involved in Politics, my impression of Westminster and the people of Parliament was that of another world. It was somewhere behind locked doors where mortals rarely entered and where Sir Humphrey used every effort to preserve his antiquated gentlemen's club. Whether my impression wa...
Some would say 'the trouble with young people today is that all they do is watch TV and play console games', oh yes, and drink too much at high street hostelries. The perception is oft an unfortunate truth. In times gone by the local pub was the usual place to socialise, with their bar games, cards...
Last week a news story broke in this paper which was also well covered by BBC TV as their lead item on Friday's South East Today. The argument was about ambulance visits lurching away from Maidstone, mainly to Pembury. Patients at the newly opened hospital complained of excessive waiting times and ...
Sustaining successful and happy societies requires strong and united communities - places where people work together toward a common good. Issues that have galvanized the local populous here over recent years have, unfortunately, been a fight to save rather than a push to create; Preserving our cou...
During this conference season recess I joined a small group of MPs visiting a country of 1.2 billion people as guests of their Government. We were in India to see social, political and economic developments and learn about what challenges and opportunities might lie within for our own country. With...
When a crisis hits, its impact is often determined less by the severity of the challenge than by the timeliness and effectiveness of the response. Mindful of this I am flabbergasted at the manner in which the leaders of the 'eurozone' are responding to the crisis. The speculators are having a field...
Prior to the General Election last year the Parliamentary Summer Recess continued right through to the end of the Party Conference season in Mid October. Not any more, and rightly so in these challenging times. In fact the two week period at the beginning of September is now one of the busiest times...
One of the challenges I have consistently faced since the election 16 months ago is to try and explain to constituents what an MP does, and equally what perhaps should be done by someone else, maybe a Borough or County Councillor. Many people have little or no real idea and that is a failure of our ...
Many readers in my age group and beyond will surely remember the tune to 'Love grows where my Rosemary goes, and nobody knows but me'. The song's pervading cheerfulness, deftly performed live by 70's band Edison Lighthouse, perfectly reflected the atmosphere of a very special evening this week at Ma...
'Is it possible you could take a little break from Oaken Wood and supporting fruit growers onto some more pressing matters such as why commuters from Maidstone will have to pay extortionate above inflation price hikes just to get to work'. These were the vexed words of one Maidstone commuter in my i...
The fall-out of last week's rioting continues to grab the national headlines, with the political parties vying for position with policies and ideas about how to respond and how to prevent. There is no quick fix but I believe much can be gained from huge amount of work already carried out by The Cent...
This week I had intended to write a good news story about young people in Maidstone & the Weald. It was about aspiration, success and achievement. I find it impossible, however, to talk about something that is so completely at odds with the events that have been unfolding on our TV screens in th...
Do you remember when you had to save up if you wanted something and if you didn't have the money you couldn't have it? There was even a bit of a stigma attached to buying things on the 'never never' and saving up had great strengths. Doing errands and working weekends as a chamber maid at the Crest...
Not being a person who dwells on the negative aspects of our world I found myself in uncomfortable territory this week. The famine in the Horn of Africa is a human disaster of such enormity that it is hard to imagine the extent of the suffering. There are an estimated 12 million lives hanging in th...
A few years ago one shuddering phone call knocked me completely off balance. I heard that my Mum had been involved in a head-on car collision whilst on holiday. They said she was unconscious, in intensive care, that I should come straight away and that I should prepare myself for the worst. It was a...
It's everywhere you look, so I am not going to go on about it, but I cannot let this week go by without paying my respects to those who have been the victims of the phone hacking scandal. It is one of the ugliest domestic news stories I have witnessed in my lifetime. My thoughts lie with the familie...
Tens of thousands of mortar boards are being thrown into the air at this time as proud families gather for graduation ceremonies across our country. And we were among them with our hearts and hankies on our sleeves. The metamorphosis of my straggly boy into a chiseled and dashing serviceman was an ...
I am often asked 'what is your typical day' and my short reply is 'there isn't one'. Responding to the mass of incoming communications and maintaining a busy diary is ever ongoing but the rest is very varied and often unexpected. Tuesday this week starts with an ominous email; 'colleagues who norma...
The school exam season is coming to an end – hooray! This year I have taken my third set of GCSEs, and they don't get any easier. This lot were my youngest son Joel's and two years ago it was his brother Ben's ordeal. But like thousands of other Mums and Dads in Maidstone and the Weald, I suff...
Ever mindful of the welfare of Maidstone's 36 Engineer Regiment and our Queens Gurkha Engineers I took great interest in the third reading of the Armed Forces bill in the House of Commons this week. One of the principal issues is Clause 2 which deals with the Military Covenant. In our country there...
I regularly receive lobbying letters about last January's introduction of the English Baccalaureate (EBac) into our schools curriculum. My position is that I support the principle of the EBac as a method of allowing students to pursue a variety of courses without being bound, too quickly or early, t...
Ken Clarke was recently castigated for an injudicious choice of words. He was discussing criminal sentencing and became flustered by a sharp radio interviewer who focused on different categories of rape. The national media laid-in, recklessly lumping together all victims of rape into a single undiff...
Readers who are unfamiliar with the County town of Maidstone might be forgiven for guessing the Allington Belle is a twin of the Brighton Belle, the famous Pullman class electric train service which ran from Brighton to London in art deco style from 1933 to 1972. Oh! that Southeastern Trains were to...
In May 2010 the Secretary of State for Health, Andrew Lansley, published four criteria which needed to be satisfied if hospital reconfigurations were to be allowed to proceed. The support of GPs was one of them. On 22nd December 2010 he approved the reconfiguration of Womens' and Childrens' services...
There is much debate in the air about the Big Society, about what it means, and whether it is a mere smokescreen as some cynics would have us believe. For me, as a concept, the Big Society is a way of thinking and a way of living that is the opposite of relying on the state. It is about moving towa...
One of the questions I have often been asked in interviews is 'if there was one thing you could do for your constituency what would it be?' And my answer is 'to strengthen our County Town and its rural communities as an enviable place for people to live and work and for businesses to thrive'. It is...
The Secretary of State's recent decision to allow the reconfiguration of womens' and childrens' services between Maidstone and Pembury Hospitals is so irrational that it gives me hope. This may sound somewhat perverse but if we are to get the decision overruled then it will be the absurdity of the ...
In Westminster recently I sponsored a long established Christmas lunch event organised by one of our distinguished constituents; Lt Col (retd) Brian Awford RE of Cranbrook. Running since 1977 these lunches are attended by former members of 9 Independent Airborne Squadron RE together with serving of...
One humorous festive card I have noticed this year features the legend 'women and turkeys against Christmas'. Sadly the intended joke will only be a fearful reminder for the hundreds of women, and some men, who were beaten last Christmas and know that they will almost certainly suffer again, at leas...
In the Kent Messenger published 22/10/10 many of the most important leaders in Maidstone's voluntary and charity sector rightly and properly set out a series of reasons why great care must be taken when the inevitable forthcoming cuts are made in our public services. They have my full support. Havi...
And great news about #parenting today. It will provide great support for new mums and dads
4 hours ago
Finished my afternoon Sugery. Now on the way from Frittenden to the Medway for the Maidstone River Users Group AGM. Will be a lovely evening
4 hours ago
RT @RicHolden: Cameron BBC clip on #parenting - makes clear how the Government are planning to help parents and new mums particularly. h ...
7 hours ago
