We did not receive a reply from Jayne.

My Name is Jenny Bamber and I am First For Kirkby’s Candidate for the newly configured Cherryfield Ward. This is my 2nd year standing and I feel privileged to have been given the opportunity to stand again.

I have a young family growing up in Kirkby and I have lived here all my life. My family are my drive and determination to keep me working in our community to try and make positive changes, as anyone who’s a parent or grandparent knows, we do what is for the best for our families.

In the past few years I have been working within our community with food banks and local companies, I have worked with residents with various issues, such as housing, rent and bedroom tax, and I am a volunteer at the Kirkby Festival and The local Woman’s Group.

Last year whilst running my FFK campaign I ran other campaigns and petitions alongside of it to save our lollipop ladies, to save our woman’s hospital, and I campaigned an joined protests to save our NHS and help the homeless. This year I have been looking around my ward speaking to our residents and local traders about the lack of facilities in our town and I have been attending meetings with local companies to encourage them to invest in our town.

In the upcoming weeks FFK have secured meetings with our new developer St Modwens to discuss how we can positively move forward as a community.

I plan to set up a community group in Field Lane and Southdene holding monthly meetings to enable us to come together and find out what the people want and more importantly what we need in our Town.

When I joined First For Kirkby it was because I wanted change, I was fed up, and I still am to be fair, with the lack of facilities we have.
The Town Centre should be the hub of our Town, a meeting place, a place where we have a selection of eateries, shops an bars and a decent sized supermarket so we don’t have to travel out of town for our everyday essentials.

When I was a kid there was always something to do, we had the Bracknell Centre youth Club, the sports stadium, Kirkby baths, our local community centres held band nights for the kids and Morris dancing, our community college was open and fully functioning and we could go in and use the computers, our library had fun days and events, so we rarely got up to mischief. Today our children have nothing.

Why Kirkby??? Kirkby is in crisis, Kirkby NEEDS YOU, without you Kirkby will continue to decline as it has in previous years.

We need local residents voted in in the council chamber who will not sit back and watch facilities lost here be re-located to Huyton, or cuts not being shared evenly across the borough. We are not tied to a labour whip and can debate to force them to either justify …

The statement ran to 559 words, so we’ve omitted the last 59 words.

Knowsley needs a Council which is more accountable and we want to do that. Labour have taken local voters for granted for too long.

We did not receive a reply from Jackie.

We did not receive a reply from David.

We did not receive a response from Eddie.

I’ve been a Kirkby resident all of my 46 years. Having cerebral palsy from birth I credit the very mild nature of it down to the constant coaching as a child, often on their own time, to the staff of the old sports stadium. I credit them whenever I can as I doubt they knew then or know now what a massive difference they made to me physically. It was therefore the demolition of the stadium that made me sit up and think how much Kirkby has changed and what we have lost. Thanks to them I was able to go away and study through further and higher education and embark on what so far has been a rewarding career. I believe that any young person can achieve great things if they are given the opportunities, and it saddens me that the opportunities I had are no longer there.

My main concern for the town is the education system and I feel every school should be able to offer a full curriculum in all subjects. All Saints do excellent work offering A Levels in some subjects. However we need to aspire to every subject being available to every child in every school. As I acquired my education late in life, leaving school at 16 with no qualifications I am especially concerned with the lack of further education today for adults without travelling having to travel to Huyton. There are ways to address this, without much cost which I have outlined elsewhere.

After recent disappointments I am hopeful the new developer, St Modwen, will bring the long overdue improvements to the town centre. St Modwen come to this long term problem with a clean slate and will have my full support providing they would be looking to work with the community to enable us all to feed in to plans the things we feel we need. I am passionate about improving the life chances and employment prospects of residents and feel if we get the town centre right there will be a ripple effect lifting the prospects of the entire town with it.

I find myself today as a First for Kirkby candidate having met some brilliant people just a few years ago having joined a community group. A group I got a lot of pleasure from attending, bringing together local people with different skills to help residents on a wide range of issues. If elected I envision seeking to form a similar group of like minded people to meet weekly, combining skills found in the community with my desire to be available for a weekly surgery in the ward.

We did not receive a response from Mike.

We did not receive a response from Marie.

We did not receive a reply from Tony.

I am running for TUSC (Trade Unionists and Socialist Coalition) in this upcoming election because the ordinary working class people, the poor and the vulnerable should not be punished for a crisis they simply didn’t cause.

This Tory government, with help from the Labour Party councils, have decided that the poorest can shoulder the burden of cuts, while the richest in society get away with it.

TUSC candidates highlight the need for a government willing to fix this rotten and broken system we now find ourselves in. No other party is campaign against cuts, which are not necessary, and even Labour under Jeremy Corbyn is still failing to prove a worthy opposition.

The welfare state was created to drag us out of the bombed out towns and into a system with nationalised transport systems, a national healthcare and a welfare system to provide for the needs of all.  However, 30 years later we saw Thatcher absolutely rip up the country and industry, even after the country had seen its best debt figures for centuries.  They, like Tories and Labour today, have turned their backs on the 99% and the people whom they represent and put this country back years in terms of progress.

This is why TUSC is the best solution to help get us out of this mess, and the only alternative to austerity

What all TUSC councillors will do:

• Oppose ALL cuts to council jobs, services, pay and conditions
• Refuse to implement the Bedroom Tax or the new attacks on housing benefit-cuts related arrears.  Withdraw all court proceedings and eviction orders and call on housing associations to do the same.
• Support all workers’ struggles against the cuts, forcing ordinary people to pay for the crisis caused by the bankers and bosses.
• Reject increases in council tax, rent and service charges to pay for government cuts.
• Vote against the privatisation of council jobs and services, or the transfer of council services to ‘social enterprises’ or ‘arms length’ management, which is the first step towards privatisation.
• Oppose racism and fascism and stand up for equality for all.
• Campaign for TUC’s policy for a £10 an hour minimum wage for everyone.
• Say no to academies. We stand for free education for all.
• Personally, I will fight to get local kids to register with a local dentist (Knowsley has the WORST child-dentist registration rate in the county), liaising with the local dentists and schools.  I am appalled that the A-level courses have been dismantled in most Knowsley six-forms and colleges. I will help fight to see them return.

I’ll be available at all times, show a transparency and dedication to the Tower Hill people that labour simply do not provide.

If you share our optimism that TUSC can provide a clear alternative and/or you would like to hear more, then PLEASE, VOTE FOR ME on May 5th or contact me on 07549788822 to discuss.

Neill Dunne

TUSC candidate for Shevington Ward.

We did not receive a reply from Ray.

We did not receive a reply from Linda.

We did not receive a response from Sean.

I have been a resident in Kirkby for 59 years, apart from 5 years when I served in the Royal Navy.

I have seen many changes in this Town as I have grown up Married and started my own family and now have three grown up Daughters who are at the start of their Adult lives.

In my lifetime, Kirkby has changed dramatically, from a Town where I and my children received a good Education, equal to other areas in England.

Employment was in abundance on Kirkby Industrial Estate with a diverse range of Quality Employers paying good Wages supporting the Local Economy.

The Current

‘One Party State’

Of the Labour Party is to blame for the current situation our Town is faced with,

Lowest Educational Achievement Nationally this year with NO future A Level Provision1

High Unemployment in our area, Kirkby Industrial Estate has become the dumping ground for all Merseyside Waste with other dangerous waste recycling plants opening.2

High sickness rates with lower than average Life expectancy.

One of the worst Town Centre Shopping Facilities in any Northwest Town of comparable size, Tesco’s failure to deliver, and the new Town Centre owners lack of urgency in providing detailed plans for a new Town Centre will mean several more years of no adequate shopping facilities and yet, we are forced to pay exorbitant car parking charges AND FINES for that privilege.

Houses are being built on every scrap of ‘green space’ when there is no need apart from the profits for developers.

The national Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn is a far cry from the local Labour Party, don’t be misled.

I have stood previously in the Local Elections concentrating on Whitefield Ward, slowly more people are starting to vote . Our local problems have worsened with pathetic excuses from the local Labour Party, such as

‘It’s not their fault’

‘It’s the Conservative Government’

‘We have to make cuts’

‘We’ve got no money’

Knowsley Labour Council statements are excuses. I challenged the Council, on Roger Philips Radio Merseyside Show two years ago over the Stockpiled Reserve Fund of £75,000,000, the response by the Council Cabinet Member for Finance implied a much smaller amount was in reserve,

Twelve months later, 2015, the Council announced they will be using around half of the £75,000,000 Reserve to finance key services. The previous deniability is strange.

Some expenditure is questionable . The Councillors wisdom approved an initial £6,000,000 will be spent on the Shakespeare Centre in Prescot from a tenuous link to Shakespeare that he may have stayed overnight on one occasion in Knowsley.

This money is being spent at a time when Council services and the workforce are being slashed. The money could be much better spent.

In the past, Knowsley has operated Rewards for Failure, massive payoffs for the previous Chief Executive, No-one should be rewarded for failure.

Vote for me as an

‘INDEPENDANT CANDIDATE’’

TRUST ME

To do the right things for you

Editors notes:

1 Contrary to the All Saints High School’s website the school is reported to have ended provided A-levels since September 2015 following the school’s poor Ofsted Report and being placed into special measures.

2 Kirkby only currently has a Household Waste Recycling Facility, but a new Rail Waste Transfer Stations is planned, as is an incinerator, on Kirkby Industrial Estate.

We did not receive a response from Norman.

We did not receive a reply from Geraldine.

We did not receive a response from Ros.