Local MP Tim Farron has expressed his grave concern at figures he has obtained today from the North West Ambulance Service which show that were the heart and stroke unit at Westmorland General Hospital to close, almost two-thirds of patients would face an ambulance journey of an hour or more.
Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat Countryside Spokesman, has today issued a parliamentary motion calling for the government to intervene to guarantee UK food security by tackling the steady decline in the number of farm units due to financial pressures. Mr Farron says that this decline is due to developments such as the shocking decline in the quota price of milk in the last twenty years, which has crashed from circa 32 pence/litre in 1988 to circa 1 pence/litre in 2008.
As the first anniversary of the tragedy approaches, local MP Tim Farron has repeated his call for a public inquiry into the cause of the train derailment at Grayrigg in February last year. Mr Farron has met with Transport Ministers in the past to urge them to carry out an inquiry, and has also written to the Prime Minister on the issue.
The former Conservative Member of Parliament for Blackpool North, Harold Elletson is visiting Tim Farron's constituency this Friday for a coffee morning with local members of the Liberal Democrats.
Local MP Tim Farron has written to the Competition Commission today asking that they look into the conduct of pub chains in relation to lessees. Mr Farron has tabled a Commons Motion criticising the pub chains that have in many cases been raising rent and other costs, forcing many pub landlords into hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of debt.
Tim Farron MP, the Liberal Democrat Countryside Spokesman, today congratulated the local winner of the Countryside Alliance's third annual Best Rural Retailers Competition. This year the winner of the Cumbria area of the competition was Garth Steadman, proprietor of 'Steadman's Butchers.' Steadman's Butchers have won this award whilst being supplied almost exclusively through locally reared meat.
