I came back from my honeymoon to the usual mountain of mail. And like everyone else does, I immediately cast it all aside to reach the local free paper from a fortnight ago.

I wasn’t happy though, when I read the Prestwich Advertiser of 5th August.

In it, a local Labour activist queried why I hadn’t replied to a previous letter of his asking a simple question about how the Lib Dems had voted in Council this year. His original letter had hinted that there was a deal between the Lib Dems and Tories locally which could be seen when analysing how we’d all voted. It was a reasonable question, and one which, since someone had taken the trouble to ask, should have been answered.

I was annoyed though, because I had replied to the letter originally, only for the paper not to print the reply! Not only had the paper not printed my reply, but they’d now printed a letter criticising me for not replying!

I am very conscious of the need to answer questions from anyone, even dyed-in-the-wool Labour activists out to make my party and me look bad. I haven’t ever shied away from doing that, either in the press or on here. It really gets me angry when it’s suggested otherwise, particularly in the press when it’s simply not true.

The Prestwich Advertiser should know better. I hope their approach in this instance isn’t a symptom of their recent takeover by the people who own the Daily Mirror, the most voraciously pro-Labour / anti-Lib Dem national paper of the lot. I don’t think it is, because their news coverage has been very fair of late. But the letters page is a key local opinion-former, and it’s important that they don’t make mistakes like this.

To be clear, I have sent a letter to them this week explaining their mistake (together with a copy of the original reply I sent) and again answering the original question. Just so that an answer to the original query is in the public domain, I will put on here what is in the letter, namely that there have been two Council meetings since the local elections. Overall there have been five final motions put to the vote. The votes cast were as follows:
 
1) Motion on Six Town Housing – Conservatives and Lib Dems voted the same way.
2) Motion on cuts – All three parties voted the same way.
3) Motion on appointing the Leader - Labour and Lib Dems voted the same way.
4) Motion on appointments to committees – Conservatives and Labour voted the same way.
5) Motion on remunerations – All three parties voted the same way.
 
So, despite the original letter (and its follow up) hinting that there is some kind of deal between the Tories and the Lib Dems, the facts are otherwise.

Hopefully that will be printed in this week’s paper to set the record straight!

Rick