I feel that people should have sibling rights. I have been going through a kinship assessment for the last few months so i can bring up my little brother who is 1, to be unsuccessful for absolute ridiculous reasons. I applied to become his kinship carer after our mum died in june last year. I haven't seen my brother in over 10 months now, all i have had is 3 photos. Social work has said I won't be getting contact with him any time soon as he is being adopted and he might or might not be told about me and my family in the future, this seems to be happening far too much, children being kept away from their birth families and its wrong. I should be allowed to form a relationship with my brother so he can grow up knowing exactly where he came from and that we love him.

Trowbridge Birthing Centre offers crucial services for mothers and families in the area. I had two of my children at the unit, and the centre offered me a very personalised service. It is essential that women have the choice to give birth locally, and this unit is a respected and well-loved option. Trowbridge Birthing Centre also offers much needed antenatal and postnatal services for local women and babies.

There is no safe level of asbestos exposure. We don't want to wait 30 years for a cancer cluster in Cranleigh to prove that we are at risk from our drinking water. We want independent testing to be carried out now to assess the risk to public health. Almost 30% of the drinking water supply pipes in Cranleigh (highlighted in pink on the above map) are made from asbestos cement (AC), compared to a reported average of 2% throughout the rest of the Thames Water Region. The pipes are between 50 and 70 years old and frequently burst, increasing the amount of free asbestos fibres entering the drinking water supply. Evidence shows that ageing AC drinking water pipes also degrade internally over time through water friction and low pH levels, releasing free asbestos fibres into the drinking water supply. Furthermore, an increase in water pressure within these deteriorating AC pipes to accommodate significant housing development in Cranleigh will lead to more bursts and the release of more asbestos fibres. The United States Environmental Protection Agency has been testing for asbestos fibres in drinking water since 1992 due to decaying AC water mains. No one is testing our drinking water for asbestos fibres, no one is calculating the risk to residents in Cranleigh.

The enforcement notice at Caverswall Castle means the castle cannot be used for any commercial activity. The castle is unable to operate commercially due to the outdated and ambiguously worded enforcement notice. This needs withdrawing urgently so the castle can have a commercial use which will bring in money to maintain the property. This notice even prevents school children from visiting. If the notice is removed the Castle can be enjoyed by local people and tourists. It would allow the castle to bring in money to help maintain it and bring jobs and tourism to the local economy. 

 If the notice isn’t removed the Castle will continue to deteriorate and this could lead to the ruin of the only moated castle in Staffordshire.

Our NHS is being trapped in debt by schemes called “PFIs” - private finance initiatives. These schemes lead to private companies taking up as much as one-sixth of local NHS budgets. These schemes were designed to help NHS trusts invest in big projects - but they’ve been terrible value for money. In total the NHS will have to pay £80 billion for projects worth only £13 billion. And because these contracts run for a long time, the worst is still to come. Our NHS will have to pay another £55 billion by the time the last contract ends in 2050. That’s money that will never go to cancer treatment, maternity wards, or care for the elderly. The NHS was created to save lives, not pay off debt to private companies. It’s time to end this waste and let the NHS spend money on what it does best. You can find out more information about PFIs and how they work here: Full Fact: What is the NHS paying for Private Finance Initiatives?: https://fullfact.org/health/what-nhs-paying-private-finance-initiatives/

If the plans go ahead, treasured spaces to play will be lost. Children’s play is a right not a privilege: the loss of local playgrounds would be to the detriment of our children’s health, safety and their happiness. These spaces are also used by parents and grandparents. You can read about the Council's plans to close the playgrounds here: Hertfordshire Mercury: Plans to axe North Hertfordshire play areas criticised: https://link.38degrees.org.uk/plans5e32

Loftus Library was purpose built for the Community and is centrally located with good access. It has parking for 7 cars, disabled parking and is DDA compliant and also has room out front for deliveries. It is designated a Walkers are Welcome and Breastfeeding friendly premises. It also has a disabled toilet and baby changing facilities. The Library as it stands has 11 public computers giving internet access for those doing job searches, applying for universal credit and other benefits as well as a host of other accessible online services. Citizen Advice hold surgeries twice a month. MIND are in 3 times a week. Learn Direct and other educational agencies use the Library, hold classes and meet with students on an outreach basis to assess their progress. Groups such as the Local and Family History group meet weekly whilst Accord Walking Group meet monthly. The Library welcomes any Voluntary Group or Community group that wishes to meet. They also host Council surgeries. As one of the Headmasters of a Primary school in Loftus has said”' A properly funded and professionally run Library service ensures the development of our education and helps everyone to play an active role in society. A professionally run and properly funded library service alleviates pressures on the most vulnerable by providing them with access to resources they may require. This proposal reduces Loftus Library to a book exchange. A Library is much more than that. Libraries play a crucial role in levelling the playing field and ensuring the everyone has the opportunity to fulfill their potential. For children Libraries provide a safe space to ensure that the poorest have access to the same resources as the wealthiest. This ensures that the children from the poorest backgrounds are not left behind and give us the best possible chance to address poor literacy standards. A good book can spark the imagination of a child. Without a good library , none of these are possible” We cannot emphasise enough the importance of our Library building in our Community. We have little enough as it is - to move the valuable resource to another building with opening hours causing concern and a building owned by a charity who rely on grants and donations do not give our library a long term guaranteed future..

On 29th March, Citizens UK will be holding a public debate for the West Midlands mayoral election, where they want their 1,000 delegates to be able to meet the potential mayors. But - the 1,000 delegates aren't being allowed to meet the Green Party, Ukip or Lib Dem candidates - they are only inviting Labour and the Tories! The BBC found this shocking and hard to understand, and featured the issue on BBC WM this week. It is accepted by broadcasters in the UK now that Ukip, the Green Party and the Lib Dems are all major political parties and they have been invited to every debate in this campaign so far - dozens of them - with the one exception of the Citizens UK event. In an ironic twist, Citizens UK even used James Burn (Green Party) and Beverley Nielsen (Lib Dems) as part of the advertising for their event held on 19th November 2016. Originally Citizens UK actually invited Liberal Democrat candidate Beverley Nielsen, but after the Green Party complained to their board about unfairly being excluded, Citizens UK outrageously *withdrew* their invitation to the Lib Dems, as if somehow that was better! This is an incredibly wrong-headed way to handle being called out for being undemocratic. Citizens UK are claiming their event is not a debate, but a "private event" that the public can't come to. This simply isn't true. Tickets to this "private event" are freely available to the public - get yours here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/west-midlands-citizens-mayoral-assembly-2017-tickets-30131646566 And even if it were a "private event", surely a grass-roots organisation who claims to champion democracy and equality, that welcomes diversity and speaks up for the most disadvantaged should be inviting all the candidates, not just the establishment, white middle-aged men. To exclude the only woman, the only candidate from the Black Country and the only young candidate, is bizarre at best. If you support democracy, please sign this petition. Citizens UK: please live up to the ideals you claim you stand for.

Palm Oil production is bad news in so many ways! It destroys wildlife by cutting down the Rainforest to plant palm oil plantations. Many iconic species such as the Orangutan are disappearing at an alarming rate. And that's not all.... it is contributing to increased poverty among local communities who work in the plantations for little return. Only making the big corporations bigger and more powerful at the expense of wildlife and the local population. But perhaps the biggest threat is deforestation - ''According to the World Wildlife Fund, an area the equivalent size of 300 football fields of rainforest is cleared each hour to make way for palm oil production''. This is all adding to the huge problem of Climate Change , due to the lack of trees to soak up the carbon and forest fires emitting huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. The world is getting warmer, the past four years we have had little or no snow in the winter. We all should be standing together globally to tackle this problem. Although it seems that we are powerless as a consumer , by signing this petition it will show big corporations like Tesco that consumers will not accept palm oil in its products. Tesco should step up its act and be an example to other big cooperation's in it's commitment to ending this madness of using pam oil in products. Please take a minute out of your life to sign my petition. Thank you so so much xxxx

NHS bosses in Bedford are drawing up plans to cut and close local services. The plan is short on detail -but there’s a £311m funding gap for Milton Keynes, Bedfordshire and Luton. The plan outlines proposed major changes to specialist hospital care in order to ensure those services are 'financially sustainable'. It looks like big changes are on the table. Cuts and closures aren’t the only option. If the government gave the NHS the money it needs, it’d mean decisions like these could be made with patients in mind, rather than saving money. We're calling on our MP, Richard Fuller, to stand up for the NHS in Bedford. So far, it doesn’t look like he’s said much. But if thousands of us sign a petition asking him to demand the NHS gets more funding, it’ll show him that he needs to speak out.

NHS bosses in Lewes are drawing up plans to cut and close local services. The plan is short on detail - but there’s a £864m funding gap for Sussex and East Surrey. The plan is short of important detail on how it'll close the funding gap without cuts or closures to services. But it looks like big changes are on the table. Cuts and closures aren’t the only option. If the government gave the NHS the money it needs, it’d mean decisions like these could be made with patients in mind, rather than saving money. We're calling on our MP, Maria Caulfield, to stand up for the NHS in Lewes. So far, it doesn’t look like she’s said much. But if thousands of us sign a petition asking her to demand the NHS gets more funding, it’ll show her that she needs to speak out.

NHS bosses in Thurrock are drawing up plans to cut and close local services. The plan is short on detail - but there’s a £630m funding gap across Mid and South Essex. Three hospitals and potentially two of the area's A and E’s could lose services. It looks like big changes are on the table. Cuts and closures aren’t the only option. If the government gave the NHS the money it needs, it’d mean decisions like these could be made with patients in mind, rather than saving money. We're calling on our MP, Jackie Doyle-Price, to stand up for the NHS in Thurrock. So far, it doesn’t look like she’s said much. But if thousands of us sign a petition asking her to demand the NHS gets more funding, it’ll show her that she needs to speak out.