Richard Baum

Bury South’s Labour MP Ivan Lewis, fresh from voting to support the government’s plans to close local post offices, has today launched a stinging attack on his own party just weeks before the local elections.

In an interview with the News of The World, Mr Lewis said that he believes that the Labour party is “out of touch with ordinary people.” His interview has forced senior ministerial colleagues into desperate efforts to hold the party together.

Mr Lewis said that, after 11 years in power, Labour was often “too often silent on the daily realities facing hardworking families.” Perhaps in his most devastating indictment of his own party’s government, Mr Lewis said that “instead of being on the side of the people, too often we simply defend the status quo, even when it is unacceptable.”

Our local MPs words will certainly strike a chord with local voters disgruntled with the policies of both the Labour government and the local Labour party here in Prestwich. Nationally, Labour have once again betrayed local people by pressing forward with a post office closure programme that hits communities hard and puts profits before people. Both Ivan Lewis and Bury North Labour MP David Chaytor voted for this closure programme just days ago. Here in Bury, Labour’s budget proposals to cut millions from services to vulnerable people in return for the cheap political stunt of a 0% Council Tax rise has been exposed for the desperate ploy that it was. And this from the party who tried to close our local school, and still refuse to join the Lib Dems in opposing congestion charging. Not only do Labour defend the status quo, they actively vote to make things worse!

Now Mr Lewis has once again shown that Labour are in chaos. On the one hand he supports the government in closing our post offices, but then he distances himself from them. Could this be another attempt to confuse the voters, I wonder? Is it any wonder that local people have been deserting Labour in droves in recent years when their party is disunited, voting for policies which rip the heart out of the community, and are “out of touch” according to their own MP?!

The Lib Dems have been resolute in their commitment to local people. We are united locally, united nationally, and firm in our beliefs in freedom, fairness and community action. Where Labour wanted to close Prestwich Arts College, we were the only party to campaign to keep it open. Whereas Labour want to close our Post Offices, Lib Dems are campaigning to keep them open. And when Labour refuse to condemn the government over congestion charging plans, we stand up for local people and say no! It’s no wonder that even Labour MPs are now saying that the government is out of touch.

I commend Mr Lewis for his honesty. I only hope that his local party’s election leaflets are equally honest from now on - exposing the Labour government’s let-downs, its high taxes and its mismanagement of the economic slowdown. Labour achieved a lot in the late 1990s, but lots of people agree that a lot has gone wrong since, and the government has fallen out of touch. Now even its own MPs are saying it.

Rick