Section: Region

Carl Garner tells it like it is – Covid

Carl Garner
Johnson at his desk, drinking tea

The current government strategy against Covid is not working. Putting your fingers in your ears and shutting your eyes to pretend it isn’t happening is not a strategy; in fact, it is the perfect definition of the opposite, and furthermore, a total abdication of the responsibility of good government.  Our hospital has had to declare […]

Cop 26 and ‘the fierce urgency of now’

Phil Shepherd
Storm - made out of rycled materials - at Cop 26

It would have been much cheaper to fly, particularly as the UK government had recently reduced air passenger duty on internal flights, but John Potter and I took the train to Glasgow for COP 26.   We didn’t have passes, or any kind of access to the conference, but wanted to see what ideas and […]

Sponsor a Ukrainian – the scheme that puts the vulnerable at risk whilst thwarting compassion

Elizabeth Smith and Anna Andrews
Ukrainian refugees in Krakow

“It’s an abusers’ charter, isn’t it?” said a friend – a woman not particularly attentive to the doings of this government, nor as prejudiced as me against these Conservatives’ policies. Sadly, I think my friend is correct in her assessment of the ‘Sponsor a Ukrainian’ scheme, whereby homeowners here can offer accommodation to Ukrainian refugees. […]

Why are Cornwall councillors busy promoting damaging trade deals with the US rather than serving their constituents?

Tom Scott
Conservative Friends of America home page

An independent report has found Conservative councillor Tara Sherfield-Wong has “demonstrated a lack of commitment to the community for which she serves”. Her activities with Conservative Friends of America raise further questions over whose interests Councillor Sherfield-Wong is really serving – and she’s not the only Cornwall councillor who is part of this organisation. Tom […]

P&O and partygate – letter to Sheryll Murray

Carl Garner
P&O flag

Dear Sheryll I am writing to you with regards to P&O. Mass sackings without consultation are illegal under European law, so why, if Brexit was meant to improve things, are a company (whose parent is in profit) allowed to fire 800 British staff to hire cheaper labour? I note with interest that no French (ie […]

Energy prices – what’s going on? Letter to David Warburton MP

Editor-in-chief
wind farm

Dear Mr Warburton, I am writing to you – with copies to local news outlets – about the recent large rise in gas and electricity prices. I am old enough to remember the oil crisis of the mid-1970s. During that period the government brought in a number of energy-saving measures; these included banning the heating of […]

Letters to Neil Parish and Sir Geoffrey Cox re Ukraine

Editor-in-chief
placard: accept refugees on background of Ukraine flag

Dear Mr Parish, I wrote to you recently about the urgent need for Ukrainian refugees to be given safe passage and supported resettlement in the UK.  You kindly replied, and in short order, which I appreciated. Thank you. However, the assurances you provided about the government’s response did not address my concerns about the shortcomings […]

How Totnes Conservatives picked their 2019 candidate…

Anon
Totnes Conservative Club

Dr Sarah Wollaston left the Conservative Party to join the LibDems, leaving a rock-solid seat-for-life for some lucky Tory. The Conservatives needed a new candidate for the election that was to come later that year. Would they pick another local candidate, known in the community? Anonymous reveals the ‘interesting’ selection process. In 2019 the fate […]

Speaking out, while we still can…

Tony Whitehead
Protesters at the Exeter rally against the Policing and Borders Bills

Reaching out across the seas Hold out our hands to refugees Make the world a better place To put a smile on everyone’s face Stop the bombing, join together International friends forever This poem by primary school children, read by Exeter’s Pete the Poet, opened a rally organised by Stop the War Coalition. More than […]

Latest dire warning from the IPCC report – what are we doing locally to counter climate breakdown?

Belinda Bawden
IPCC report cover

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published its latest report this week. The UN secretary general, António Guterres, described it as an “atlas of human suffering”. Alice Bell, co-director at the climate change charity Possible, wrote in the Guardian: “The key findings are bleak, if familiar. Climate breakdown is accelerating rapidly; many of the […]

Saving his own skin: Mr Mangnall and the squandering of leadership

Jim Funnell
Anthony Mangnall paper

In late February 2022, as bloody, terrifying war broke out in Ukraine and refugees fled their country, constituents across Totnes and South Devon received an unwelcome gift through their door: a four page newspaper full of puff pieces all about Anthony Mangnall MP. Produced by Mr Mangnall and his team, the headline cringingly announcing: ‘Anthony […]

From Frome to the front line

Richard Paul-Jones
Polish currency

“We don’t need stuff, we need cash” says the Mayor of Rabka Frome has a direct link to the war in Ukraine – and a way for you to help Ukrainians fleeing from the terror. Frome is twinned with three European towns. It is a four-way twinning, with representatives of three towns each visiting the fourth on […]

Cornwall stands with Ukraine

Tom Scott
Stand with Ukraine vigil, Truro

Speech made at the Vigil for Ukraine outside Truro Cathedral on 27 February. Thank you all so much for coming here today to express your solidarity with the people of Ukraine. These are very dark times for Europe and for the whole world. We’re seeing a peaceful, democratic nation under violent attack by a fascistic […]

Cornwall’s answer to Foster’s fruit picking offer

Jane Leigh
Ukrinian Cross Mylor Bridge

Torbay MP Kevin Foster may think it’s acceptable to view Ukraine’s beleaguered citizens as the UK’s fruit and daffodil pickers of the future (see The tweet heartless Kevin Foster didn’t want you to see – West Country Voices). But more than 100 members of the public gathered today at the Ukrainian Cross on a country […]

The tweet heartless Kevin Foster didn’t want you to see

Anthea Simmons
Kevin Foster MP for Torbay

I have written today about the government’s callousness towards Ukrainian refugees, cloaked in a nicey-nicey, flag-sporting charade of fake sympathy. The reality is that there is NO effort being made to offer sanctuary to men, women and children fleeing the war. Patel and now Torbay’s Kevin Foster have been gaslighting the British public, pretending that […]

XR urge Devon County Council to stop funding fossil fuel companies

Tony Whitehead

Climate activists from Extinction Rebellion (XR) staged a protest today [Friday 25 February] outside Devon County Hall in Exeter to highlight the county council’s continued investment in fossil fuels through its pension fund. XR rebels scaled scaffolding above the entrance to County Hall and lowered a huge banner emblazoned with “Stop Funding Fossil Fuels”. The […]

A little universe is destroyed: an unintended consequence of the countryside stewardship grant

Rebecca Gethin

You might have read about the government’s commitment to safeguarding wildlife and conserving the environment which is, according to Defra’s newly-published road map, to be “the cornerstone of the government’s new agricultural policy, based on the principle of paying public money for public goods, such as clean air and water, thriving wildlife, engagement with the […]

Tim Smit’s anti-Cornish rant: a riposte

Andrew George
Eden Project

Ed: In case you missed it, Tim Smit, of Eden Project fame, launched a bit of an attack on the Cornish (in a podcast) saying, amongst other things: “You feel, and I don’t, but you feel like saying ‘well if you were a bit more f- – -ing articulate you could speak up for yourself […]

Chris Loder: more jabbering parrot than soaring eagle

Sadie Parker
white tailed eagle soaring above Isle of Purbeck

“When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber,” Winston Churchill once said of blathering back-bench MPs. An eagle silenced by death in Dorset had erstwhile pork-pie plotter, Chris Loder, now shamefully returned to the back-bench Borstal of Boris-backers, jabbering on social media recently. It is not known how the rare young eagle came […]

Brexit’s impact on Bournemouth

Sarah Cowley
UK and EU flags on jigsaw puzzle pieces, held apart

Perhaps the journalist for Bournemouth Echo had guessed that Jacob Rees-Mogg was about to be handed the ‘exciting’ challenge of proving the advantages of Brexit. None seem to be immediately discernible. The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) released a report on 9 February, which revealed that “the only detectable impact so far is increased costs, paperwork […]

UK to miss emissions target by a mile: letter to Anthony Mangnall MP

Editor-in-chief

Dear Anthony On the Government’s own projections, the UK is set to miss the 6th carbon budget and our Paris commitment by a huge margin. We will be approximately 100 per cent over the 6th carbon budget! You have said that work is ‘underway’, but that work clearly falls far short of what’s required. You can see from the […]