St Johns Lib Dems

In tough times, the Liberal Democrats believe you should keep more of the money that you earn. That’s why the Liberal Democrats have long called for the tax-free threshold raised to £10,000 – giving you a tax cut when you need it most.
Liberal Democrat plans would save working people £700 a year –that’s an extra £60 in your wages every month. And more than 3.5million older and low-paid people will be freed from paying any income tax altogether.  This is a plan we put on the front page of our General Election manifesto and it went into the Coalition Agreement.
We have already started putting this in to practice.
In April last year, millions of ordinary working people were given a £200 annual tax cut and since last April 800,000 low paid people no longer pay any income tax at all.  But we believe our tax cuts need to happen faster and go further.  And we want your help in making it happen.
Ahead of the Budget next month, Nick Clegg and Liberal Democrats in the government will be pushing to speed up our tax plans.  Please join this campaign and sign the petition which is on the Number 10 website here.
Liberal Democrats want tax cuts for working people, not the rich.  Please help us to make that happen.

I would like to wish all the electors of St John’s Ward peace and joy at Christmas. Wishing you also a prosperous and successful New Year of 2012.

Lib Dem Leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has outlined a £1 billion pound Youth Contract to tackle youth unemployment. The aim is to ensure that all jobless young people are earning or learning again before long-term damage is done.

• Over three years, the Youth Contract will provide at least 410,000 new work places for 18 to 24 year olds into work. Starting April 2012
• Including 160,000 wage subsidies and 250,000 new work experience placements.
• In addition, there will be at least 20,000 more incentive payments to encourage employers to take on young apprentices.
• A new programme to help the most disengaged 16 and 17 year olds – getting them back to school or college, onto an apprenticeship or into a job with training.

From 00.01 hours today it will be a criminal offence to fish or attempt to fish for cockles from the beds in the Ribble estuary or on the Wirral coast. At long last the ‘cockle snatchers’ who invaded local fishermen territory have been stopped by using a new emergency byelaw.
The beds are closed under section 157 of The Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009. The emergency byelaw says the purpose of the closure is for the management of cockle stocks, but other contemporaneous information supplied with the emergency byelaw,(but not part of it) says the reason for the new byelaw is to close the Ribble area to all methods of cockle gathering in order to protect public safety and reduce the impact of the fishery on other statutory regulatory authorities. (The Wirral cockle fishery is also closed to stop folk going there instead).
The purpose of the closure is to allow NWIFCA (‘North Western inshore Fisheries And Conservation Authority’) time to review (and presumably change) their byelaw No 5 under which cockling permits are issued, so they can address their incompetence drafting it in the first place.
They say they will review the position again on the 6th December.
I have spoken to some local Lytham fishermen who are sad and angry at the invasion from outsiders who have not got the best interests of the people living locally. The disruption and the cost of rescues has been outrageous.
Let’s hope we can have some peace in Lytham and support our local fishermen.

I am at present half way through a canvass in St John’s Ward to get feedback on issues that are important to you. Over the past four weeks I have managed to meet as many people on the door-steps that I possibly can. My family have helped on delivery rounds to those houses that I have not managed to get to personally,( mainly due to work committments and inclement weather).
I want to listen and take up the challenge to have your voice’s heard regarding community affairs. I intend to press on regarding matters that have been brought to light from the responses on the returned questionnaires.
The St Johns e- mail newsletter is, as I have said before proving popular. If you would like to receive a copy then please send me your e mail address to carol.pol@hotmail.co.uk.
I have met up with many friends and new acquaintances and thanks to all those for giving me a warm welcome!

Good news for many Lytham residents broke today. The appeal to build 11 new houses on countryside land outside the Lytham settlement boundary on Ballam Road has been refused.That’s two appeals on this site lost!

On Thursday the 22nd September my husband and I held a Coffee Morning in Aid of Cancer Research at the Brooklands House Retirement Home in Lytham. The Mayor and Mayoress of Fylde, Councillors Howard and Karen Henshaw kindly opened the event.
A staggering one thousand pounds was raised.

Thank you to all who heped out on the day, including staff at Brookalnds, residents, and the local Lytham Cancer Research Committee.

Deputy Prime Minister addresses the Party Conference in Birmingham. You can read the full text of the speech here.

Thousands of Liberal Democrats gathered for their annual conference in Birmingham this week. They discussed what has been achieved in the first 500 days of Government and policies for the future. Highlights include:

• After decades of campaigning, and thanks to Lynne Featherstone: Equal marriage, straight or gay.
• More power for consumers over the energy companies
• Calling time on rewards for failure in boardrooms
• New powers to turn empty homes back into family homes.
• A £500m investment in growth.

The Lib Dems are opposing calls for an immediate cut in the 50% tax rate paid by higher rate taxpayers.

Nick Clegg’s party instead wants to give more help to those on middle and low incomes who need it the most.

NIck Clegg: We need fairer taxes to help ordinary people, not tax cuts for the richest

Lib Dem Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander said, “At a time when the whole country faces serious financial challenges, the priority needs to be people on low and middle incomes.”

A key part of the coalition agreement was the Lib Dem commitment to making taxes fairer. The Lib Dems are well on their way to delivering on their pledge that no one should pay tax on the first £10,000 they earn.

Nearly a million low paid workers are no longer paying income tax thanks to this. All basic rate tax payers are paying £200 less in income tax.

Each year more and more people on low and middle incomes will gain more thanks to the Lib Dem fairer tax plan.

Danny Alexander said, “Fairer taxes is our goal. I don’t see why, in the next parliament, we shouldn’t be trying to get to a situation where people in a full-time job on the minimum wage are paying no income tax at all.”

This would mean that no one would pay tax on the first £12,500 they earn.