The problem is everybody has their own agenda, and thinks they they know what’s best for us. The other problem is women aren’t a homogeneous group, we are individuals and all have very different aspirations, wants and needs. What’s important to one woman can be irrelevant to another. That’s what makes us the wonderful individuals we are.

One of the hot topics at the moment is to increase the number of females on the boards of companies, which I personally whole heartily support. In support of this yesterday, and to try and enable women to progress to top jobs in the workplace David Cameron announced he was to examine plans under which working mothers would be given tax breaks for employing cleaners, babysitters or gardeners. All this is from a scheme being used in Sweden that has halved the cost of employing domestic help and has the added bonus of stopping domestic help from working in the cash-in-hand black market.

This resulted in a dressing down from a female Labour MP who rather obviously said how dreadful and out of touch the PM was for suggesting help for well off mothers who could afford domestic help. Damned if you do and damned if you don’t! You can see where I’m coming from here can’t you. 

It was also suggested that this would be to the detriment of tax credits going to low paid mothers. I had a quick look on HMRC’s website and it seems if you have children then you are entitled to child tax credits at varying levels on earnings up to £40,000. On earnings of £25,000 and below these are in my view significant amounts of money. Considering the average wage in the Britain is around £26,000 then this all seems quite fair. I have to say that if a person earns £40,000 pa then I’m not sure I want my taxes being used to give them child tax credits. So this all begs the question why is the Prime Minister’s potential (and it is a huge potential!) offer of help to working mothers on domestic help harming lower paid mothers.

Surely all working mothers need help at different levels and if we are to up the number at board level, schemes such as these should be considered, and I do mean just considered.

I would like us to look at how we can help all women reach their full potential and have the same opportunities as men. This could take any number of forms not all monetary. Can we not just work together sensibly on this and stop making it a battle between who’s paid what, and who is better than who?

Friday saw us host an excellent event at The Midland Hotel where our panel members along with myself were Brooks Newmark MP who is a Government Whip and also brings immense and valuable experience on the economy, Dr Brian Sloan Chief Economist for the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce and Luke Springthorpe also of PPF who did an excellent job in chairing the event (all pictured)
Dr Brian Sloan opened the meeting with a well informed and constructive view of challenges that face business in the North West. His opening concentrated on how dependent the NW has been to the Public Sector for employment, and how this has distorted the economy. He also went on to say that the NW was also exposed to the happenings in the Eurozone as 50% of it’s exports were to the Eurozone. He was positive on manufacturing which had continued to grow in the area and also how the private sector was doing well in providing jobs to those leaving the Public Sector. He also expressed strong views that in his opinion a northern hub was needed to aid congestion calming if electrification goes ahead for the regions rail links.

Brooks Newmark MP gave an excellent insight as to what the government was doing to address these problems. He outlined the necessity for the recent austerity cuts that nobody liked to do but were a necessary evil to not allowing our credit ratings to be cut, which would have disastrous consequences.
He made the point that if this were to happen and interest rates were to rise by 1% this would add £4billion in costs to business. He went on to discuss how we smooth out the distortion to the regions economy with minimum pain.

Some of the things that the Government are doing to help are;

* Simplifying taxation
* Reducing red tape for business
* Review of no fault dismissal rules which will encourage small business to hire that extra person
* Help for young people with 300,000 new apprenticeships.

Many thanks to all those who attended the event, and we look forward to welcoming you to our next event in 2012.

We are surrounded by countries in Europe who have failed to deal with their mounting debt. Without making some very difficult decisions here in the UK, one of which is to look at Public Sector Pensions, we in the UK could face being unable to pay our debts.

Figures out last week showed quite clearly that PS workers on average now earn in excess of those in the private sector.
Those in the private sector don’t have the luxury of the type of pension scheme on offer in the public sector.

I work in the public sector, I’m in the NHS pension scheme, I understand pensions……they simply can’t be sustained. Why should private sector workers effectively subsidise public sector pensions when they can’t afford them themselves?

Surely we all have to accept the fact that we are all living longer, the cost of public sector pensions is ever increasing and we simply can’t afford it. If we fail to act now this could bring about far harder decisions in the future.

I’m still very involved in party politics and currentlyhave 2 busy roles Regional Director of Women2Win in the North West – something you will hear a lot about! I’m also National Coordinator for Social Action, so any community groups out there who want a mention, just let me know. I’m also Branch Chair for North Turton in Rossendale & Darwen Constituency where last year we were fortunate enough to return Jake Berry as our Conservative MP.

I’ve been involved in politics for many years, and will continue to be so, my enthusiasm for public office hasn’t been dented whatsoever, but I do hope for the sake of my home town and our great country the dirty campaign I have experienced over the last 6 months is never repeated. I made the decision at the beginning of my campaign not to get down in the dirt with the Labour Party and I stand by the decision and would do the same again whether it meant winning or not. I also stand by the decision not to allow myself to be manipulated by promising parts of the community any special treatment. I have always advocated that where ever you live in Bolton you should be treated the same, and I stand by that.

I haven’t until now commented on the article in the Sunday Mirror. This Labour supporting newspaper camped on my doorstep early one Saturday morning a couple of weeks before the General Election – the accusation that 18 years ago in 1992, four months after I had legally separated from my x husband I had started to see someone else. How is this news you may ask yourself!

In fact I’m still with Mark and have 2 beautiful daughters as a result…..what a scandal! That article was photocopied and sent anonymously in the post with sticky addressed labels across the constituency the day before polling day.

At the count on Thursday evening/Friday morning I was heckled, jeered, and booed by a large  crowd in front of the stage who were there supporting my Labour opponent. Slanderous abuse was shouted at me and my family as I made my way to the stage for the result to be announced.  

I left immediately after I had spoken, and to be honest felt in an unsafe and unstable enviroment. I do hope my home town of Bolton isn’t going to experience any problems in the future such as those that have occurred in Burnley or Oldham.

I have a wonderful family who have been incredibly supportive of my ambitions, an amazing set of political officers who I consider to be dear friends all of whom I have to say a huge thanks to. I would also like to thank every single person who has helped me in any way whatsoever, and once again a big thanks to every single one of the 15,786 people who voted for me on May 6th – I’m only sorry that the result wasn’t what we had all hoped for.

The reality came to light when a Conservative Freedom of Information request revealed that Labour will cut 650 Doctors and 2000 nurses minimum from the NHS in England. (see http://bit.ly/bGUzSm for more information)

Locally in Bolton, they have tried to spin lies about what a Conservative Government would do with our maternity unit.

Andrew Lansley, the shadow Conservative Secretary of State for Health came to Bolton and set the record straight. He said the new centre in Bolton and the unit in Bury would be sustained.

Conservatives will keep Bolton’s maternity unit open.

Lansley went on to say, “There has been a 10 per cent increase in births across Greater Manchester, and what I am saying is we have no need to lose one unit and operate with just eight units. I fully support the super-centre at Bolton, but the fact is the numbers in the Making It Better report have not anticipated such a steep rise.”

“Today we’re talking about the importance of rebuilding society, diverting people away from crime, and there’s nowhere better than this club. The people I was talking to were all going off the rails in different ways, and this club is saving them.”

Cameron, deep in the Conservative campaign, felt he had time for a game of table tennis. Cameron was beaten by Daryl Hosker (11 to 7) who told the Bolton News: “He was good. His service was a bit hard, but other than that he was brill. Good sense of gravity and good stance.”

Bolton Lads and Girls club see David Cameron, again!

Cameron came to the club in the wake of the tragic death of Cody Turner who was only recently stabbed in Tonge Moor Road.

Cameron told the Bolton News: “You can never excuse crime, and crime has to be punished, but at the moment you have to remember before people cross the line, and before people break the law, you have to give them the chance to have a better life, and that’s what places like this do.”

Deborah & Baroness Warsi

Astley Street Community Centre saw passionate debate about what a Conservative Government could offer the communities in Bolton. Sayeeda Warsi, the Conservative Community Cohesion Minister discussed how some of Labours national policies translate into real disaster for the local communities here in Bolton. Sayeeda explained how Labours policies on communities actually divide them instead of uniting them.

Speaking about our Manifesto, she discussed how local people should be empowered to take matters into their own hands and proceeded to discuss how a Conservative government would supply the tools necessary for them to do this. Transparency on how expenses are handled came out over and over again. I promptly reinforced my pledge on how, if elected, I would publish my expenses online every month.

We heard again how important this election is for the future of our schools, hospitals and democracy. The Baroness explained how only the Conservatives have a credible blueprint for change. She tore apart Brown’s record on the economy and said that the next Conservative government would act immediately on debt to get the economy moving.

Sayeeda and Deborah taking questions