“During all of my years of campaigning upon the doorstep I have never experienced so much warmth towards a candidate as I have witnessed during this election. Ray is truly a man of the people and worthy of the tag ‘Mr Canvey’”

On Wednesday I attended the count of the Save Canvey Greenbelt referendum at the Heritage Centre. I don't think you could have got a clearer result; 56 in favour of development, almost six and a half thousand against. 

Graham Bracci and his team have done a brilliant job organising the vote.  It was quite time-consuming knocking on all those doors but I  really enjoyed doing the streets I was allocated. And it was very clear from all the islanders I spoke to that the result would be a resounding "NO!".

Communities have to be given the power back on the big decisions which affect them like planning. Not only is this right and democratic, but it will mean better decisions, because they will be taken by the people who genuinely know and care about their area - not ministers and planning inspectors who've never even been here. 

Conservatives are committed to scrapping these housing quotas that Labour have forced on local councils. And David Cameron has said he wants to see more local referendum like this one too. I only hope we get a General Election in time to save our greenbelt!

“During all of my years of campaigning upon the doorstep I have never experienced so much warmth towards a candidate as I have witnessed during this election. Ray is truly a man of the people and worthy of the tag ‘Mr Canvey’”

“Whilst other Political Parties have not been out and visited the electorate at their homes it has been the Associations policy to return to a traditional campaign where we take the trouble to ask for your vote personally”

"Out canvassing this week, we've met many voters who are furious with MPs and the expenses issue.   

As a candidate, of course, I don't get any public money to fund me. To pay for things like leaflets and postage I rely on the generosity and hard work of my local party.  As a team here, we all feel let down when we read about MPs who have been working the system.  But we know that the majority of MPs work hard and claim reasonably: they are currently being dragged down by their colleagues who have behaved so badly. And it would be mistake to think that this was just a problem for the major parties.  For example, UKIP has had all sorts of problems with some of its MEPs.

The key thing is that the next Government is not going to have any money.  It is going to have to get public spending under control.  Its MPs need moral authority if its going to get people to accept some of the difficult decisions which may need to be taken.  They must to get this authority back or we're all in trouble.

For me, the one ray of light is the decisive way David Cameron has gripped this, and put in place measures to put the Conservative house in order, now, not later.  He's not waiting for some committee to report in the summer"
 

"Yesterday Shadow Secretary of State Theresa Villiers MP visited us. I am delighted that Theresa has managed to find time to visit Castle Point. Since Theresa could well be the Transport Secretary in a future Conservative Government I was very keen that she will have already seen Castle Point at first hand."

“I have loved living on Canvey Island and my children have grown up enjoying the green open spaces that the Island offers. It was therefore really important to me that I support any initative that protects those same green spaces for my granddaughter’s generation”