I made two commitments at the last Elections specifically to the electors of Grantham – to do everything possible to save the hospital, and to get an East-West bypass. Of course my crossing the floor in the House of Commons does not change by an iota my commitment to these two causes.

There seems to have been some doubt about the course of events on the by-pass, so let me use the column this week to set the record straight.

At the beginning of the last parliament – I think in 2002 or 2003 – at the behest of the County Council I lobbied John Prescott to try to get Government funding for a Grantham by-pass. After one or two conversations, it became quite clear to me that we didn’t have a cat in hell’s chance of getting such funding – the traffic flows (and indeed the accident rate! ) were simply nothing like high enough to meet the Department of Transport’s criteria. Another way forward had to be found, or the idea would have to be abandoned.

On Friday 28 April, Quentin Davies MP had a meeting at Stamford Station with John Armitt, Chief Executive of Network Rail to discuss the need for refurbishment of the station. Afterwards Mr Davies said:

“I was very pleased that John Armitt, Chief Executive of Network Rail, accepted my invitation to visit Stamford on 28 April and see for himself the current state of the station. We had a useful site visit and discussion, at which I also introduced Mr Armitt to John Plumb, Chairman of the Stamford Civic Society, who joined me in pressing the case for the improvement.

Mr Armitt agreed that there was a case for expenditure on Stamford Station and he undertook to let me know in what timescale we might expect the funds to be made available.

13 May 2005

Rutland & Stamford Mercury Article

It is certainly a great privilege to be re-elected to Parliament – perhaps an even greater privilege than to be elected the first time. Apart from an immediate celebration with family, friends and supporters and writing a lot of thank you letters to campaigners, what do I now do about it?

The first thing is clearly to try to live up to my promises and not to let anyone think that I have taken their continued confidence for granted. We are not in government, so the question of making sure that my party fulfils its own manifesto commitments does not arise. The years ahead must be spent at Westminster trying to keep the Government up to the mark, and helping to prepare the Conservative Party to become a credible party of government again at the next election. Neither task is likely to be an easy one.