This issue is very important to citizens of Ventnor and anyone who wishes or needs to travel here. The main road to Shanklin and Sandown is currently closed and the prospect of it reopening are slim. Meanwhile, the Undercliff Drive remains closed to traffic, belying its name, with no interest from the council in restoring it. Leaving just two transport access roads into the town. Soon the Graben will be closed, albeit temporary,but this problem has a habit of returning, leaving just the Whitwell  road and a major detour via Niton to anyone wishing to reach Shanklin or Sandown. The future of Ventnor lies in its shifting strata but letting it take control should not be an option. Maybe there is not much that can be done about roads damaged beyond safe use and who knows which will be next. But the rail link offers an inviting alternative to vehicle travel to some of the Islands major towns and the mainland ferry. There is also the dreaded net zero to consider. Electric vehicles are not the answer but electric trains could have a large part to play. Let us hope that one day the trains, so rudely taken, will come back to Ventnor, and with their success the rest of the Island’s towns may follow suit and once again see trains arriving in their newly built stations.  NOW MORE THAN EVER VENTNOR MUST HAVE ITS TRAINS BACK 

“We all have a connection to care work. Even if you can't immediately think of someone who draws on support or who is a paid care worker, every time you leave your house you are likely to be passed by care workers like me driving from visit to visit. I guarantee you have neighbours who are visited by carers and that there are care homes in your community. To ensure support is available when we need it, it is essential that we are at the very least paid enough to cover the essential costs of living. Currently, vast numbers of care workers are illegally paid below the National Minimum Wage as a result of unpaid travel time. Meanwhile, our income is often insecure, with zero-hours contracts the norm. This makes it practically impossible to plan and prompts many to accept any and all of the hours they are offered, causing burnout and poor quality of care. These terms of employment add untold pressure to a role which already carries a significant level of responsibility. Is it any wonder social care faces an acute recruitment and retention crisis? Paying at least a real Living Wage for care workers which takes into account time spent travelling between visits is an essential place to start in addressing the joint crises of care quality and availability in England. It has already been done in Scotland and Wales, now - a full four years on from the nation's clap for carers - it's time to do the same in England. This country depends on care workers, and the quality and availability of support depends on the UK Government taking action. Every care worker's dignity should be protected through payment of at least the real Living Wage.” Rachel Kelso, care worker and Citizens UK community leader

Since the 1980s, over 100 NHS Hospitals have been closed, and half of NHS hospital beds have been CUT while the UK population has grown by about 10 million. Our NHS is short of properly qualified Staff, NHS beds and NHS equipment due to deliberate underfunding. And the UK is the 6th richest country in the world with no shortage of billionaires.

In Swanage we are a long way from the major hospitals, we have an older population, public transport is limited and 25% of us have no access to a car. Yet local community hospital services in Swanage (and Wareham) are reducing, beds have been closed, and staff dealing with 111 calls or booking outpatient appointments routinely miss opportunities to support much needed access to local NHS care. Also, the Swanage NHS Dentist’s list is closed to new patients. 

Ventnor is a gorgeous, commercially resurgent resort town on the Isle of Wight’s stunning south coast. Thanks to a historic Victorian road network impacted by unprecedented recent rainfall, Ventnor is now cut off from the local population centers of the Isle of Wight and the bus, train, ferry & road networks back to the mainland.   Single road closures are manageable, but the current dire state of multiple emergency road closures spanning Leeson, Gills Cliff, Bath, Graben and Southgrove roads threatens the health & wellbeing of an entire town. The lack of any overall plan to restore access & vague timeframes for repair or reopening that Island Roads seem unable to justify has created a feeling of helplessness among businesses & residents that cannot continue.   Parents cannot effectively get children to school. The vulnerable cannot access critical health services. Visitors are not returning. Deliveries are delayed or canceled. Island residents are circumventing the town. Employees cannot get to work. Jobs are being lost. Remaining roads are becoming seriously unsafe. Traffic is heavily congested resulting in vastly increased emissions.   Phil Jordan & Wendy Perera, please immediately lead from the front to create the political will & contractual leadership needed to re-open Ventnor roads NOW not in a year or more’s time when the town has become unviable.

£10 billion. That's how much the compensation bill for victims of the contaminated blood scandal could cost. But who should pay? Right now, it'll be coming out of taxpayers money, but it SHOULD also be coming out of the pockets of global drug companies that played a role in the scandal.  In the US and Japan, drug companies like Bayer and Baxter were forced to give compensation to victims of similar infected blood scandals. Now MPs and campaigners say the Government should sue for the same to happen here in the UK. Will you sign the petition today and call on the Government's Legal Department to make sure any companies implicated in the scandal here pay the price.

Fourteen years of neglect and underfunding have left education – from early years through to post-16 – in tatters. It is imperative that all political parties address this in their manifestos. Not in vague terms, with piecemeal solutions. But with meaningful proposals about how this situation will be reversed if they form the next Government.   Our schools are chronically underfunded. Primary class sizes are the highest in Europe, and secondary class sizes are the highest since records began more than forty years ago. Teachers are underpaid and overworked, resulting in the worst recruitment and retention crisis in a generation. That will not be reversed unless there is significant change to pay and terms and conditions of the education workforce.  SEND provision and mental health support for our young people is practically non-existent. We have a curriculum and assessment system that does not engage many pupils, or give each of them the chance to thrive. Many of our school buildings are in a chronic state of disrepair, literally crumbling away with the ongoing effects of RAAC and asbestos.  This is a grim picture for one of the richest countries in the world. It’s far from the ‘world class ’ education system so regularly promised by our Government. It cannot go on.   We need a Government to invest in education and to invest in our young people. If you value education, vote for education. Let’s give our children the education they deserve. 

This IS false advertising. It IS business mispractice. It IS immoral. It creates a false sense of worth and affordability and it is aimed at adding in an additional level of mysticism within pricing structures to make the end payment total seem less daunting than it is in hopes to trick people out of the money that they are spending. Businesses need to be transparent and trustworthy, this is neither. 

THERE is no doubt that football is broken. With the announcement of the General Election, the Football Governance Bill, which would have introduced a new Independent Regulator for Football, fell. But this now represents an opportunity to address the serious flaws that were in it.  We need a Bill that will tackle the growing financial inequality in the game, that ensures the regulator is truly independent, protects the heritage of clubs, champions equality and the environment, and properly consults fans and clubs. It is now up to the next Government to pick up the mantle and deliver a fairer future for football.  For the sake of fans and clubs up and down the country we need all parties to make a firm commitment that a new Bill is brought forward in the first session of the next government - a Bill that is fit for purpose.

A client, often vulnerable, should not have to call around to be repeatedly told that solicitors cannot take on a case. Despite a duty to not refuse a case, they are suitably qualified, and many solicitors discriminate. They do this by stating they "do not have capacity". This way a solicitor will pick and choose who they would take on. Often is not a solicitor who chooses the case but the paralegal deciding for the solicitor. Leaving, the most marginalised without representation. Reinstating the referral to a solicitor will help the vulnerable, help uphold their human rights, and the rule of law by actually providing access to legal aid where the UK has determined that they should receive funding for this. Else the legal aid agency is merely providing the illusion of help, without having to produce the rabbit. Not connecting them to a solicitor the UK may be denying this right by the back door. When the outgoing government removed the option to be referred, they were also silently applying a reduction in the amount of legal aid being made available. As well as gatekeeping, there are added resistances to finding solicitors. Often the legal aid search on Resolution, Law Society and the .gov website is not up to date. This adds unneeded friction to the process, at a time is everything to a person who needs to obtain and instruct solicitors. No, fixing the database will not stop the gatekeeping. Because maybe the databases are up to date. I hope that you will support the access to the legal aid agency so that you can continue to uphold the rule of law for the UK, and its human rights record.

It's important to have the NHS properly staffed, and delays in waiting come down.

VAR was introduced in 2019 to decrease incorrect decisions and make referring easier. Over the last 5 years it has made countless right calls from offsides, player misconduct and penalty decisions which the on pitch referee may have missed or misinterpreted.   Right now, the use of VAR is not perfect in the Premier League but with a few changes such as the time it takes for a decision to be made and relaying the information to the fans in the stands it could be better. Other sports have benefited greatly by the introduction of video evidence such as rugby union and cricket, so why not football? Keeping VAR and reducing the mistakes made by humans in their application of the technology, could improve the game and do what it set out to do in the first place….which is to ensure the game we all love so much is fairer