UNFORTUNATELY, it was not a surprise to read in the Mail that Lib Dems are refusing to support the Fair Deal for Hull campaign against their Government's unfair treatment of the city over council funding.
After all, without Lib Dem backing in Parliament, this unjust distribution of local authority funding cuts, hitting the poorest communities hardest, against which we are campaigning, could never have been imposed on Hull in the first place.
Under these cuts, each person in Hull, the country's tenth most deprived area, will lose £228.36 between 2010 and 2015. Meanwhile, Surrey Heath, the 324th most deprived area, loses only £24.54 per head over the same period.
Whatever efficiencies are found, Hull councillors still face tough decisions on cutting frontline services that will do further harm to our local economy in terms of lost jobs and squeezed incomes. We've already seen stories in the Mail about libraries, social care and children's centres.
It seems that Hull Lib Dems object to the fact that I, as a Labour MP, supported the previous Labour Government that gave Hull a much fairer deal on funding and annual increases – a massive contrast to what is happening now.
Lib Dem councillor Mike Ross asks what I was doing to work for a Fair Deal for Hull in previous years, starting with the period from 2006 when Labour was in government and Lib Dems ran Hull City Council. In fact, I found a lot to keep me busy in seeking a fair deal for Hull in those years.
I worked for a fair deal for Hull kids when the Lib Dems blocked Hull from getting the free swimming scheme that other parts of the country were enjoying.
I opposed the Lib Dem decision to axe Hull's pioneering free healthy school meals policy in 2007. Five years on in Hull, under the coalition, we now have growing malnutrition, increasing child poverty and soaring reliance on food banks.
I opposed Lib Dem attacks on local sports clubs over charges.
Cllr Ross refers to the Royal Mail Ltd post office closure programme and repeats old lies about me. I did not vote against any parliamentary motion to provide even more state funding to save more branches because there was never such a motion on the table. I did organise a public meeting in Hull North to get Royal Mail Ltd to justify its plans. Not one Lib Dem councillor showed up.
In the years since the coalition Government was formed, it would be reasonable to say that it has been more challenging trying to get a fair deal for Hull. It has not just been about town hall funding. There has been a long list of regressive policies utterly damaging to Hull and to the poorest people in the most deprived areas of our country.
I opposed the unfair increase in VAT that the Lib Dems suddenly backed as soon as they entered Government. This was one of the first of the coalition's changes to tax and benefits that slash the family incomes of lower-paid working people.
I've opposed the unfair Lib Dem-backed move to cut the 50p tax rate, giving 8,000 millionaires an average windfall of £107,000 from April.
I opposed the wasteful top-down NHS reorganisation that Lib Dem backing allowed through, even though it wasn't even in the coalition agreement or any party manifesto. This is now leading to a huge local NHS redundancy bill, cuts and privatisation.
I've opposed the police cuts that have been voted through by Lib Dems, even though Nick Clegg promised at the 2010 General Election, in full knowledge of the deficit, 3,000 more police. We now have the lowest police officer numbers in and around Hull since 1979. Yet more police cuts are in the pipeline.
I've campaigned against the 27 per cent Government cut to flood defence funding that Lib Dems supported, once in Government.
I've opposed the cruel, unfair and chaotic "bedroom tax" Lib Dems have supported and repeatedly defended to the hilt in parliament.
Last year, I campaigned for a fair deal for Hull's caravan industry in the face of the "caravan tax", as ever voted through by Lib Dems.
With 90 per cent of the UK caravan industry in and around Hull, this job-destroying measure was especially unfair to the Hull area. Protests helped to get this tax reduced to 5 per cent, but any new tax will not help the industry when it starts in April.
I campaigned for a fair deal for Orchard Park after the Lib Dem-backed coalition axed the £160m regeneration scheme that had been signed off by the previous Labour Government. A much smaller £15m scheme is currently being developed by the Labour Council and Riverside Housing.
I opposed the tripling of student tuition fees that the Lib Dems forced though, even though they had pledged to abolish them. For good measure, they also axed the Educational Maintenance Allowance, a hugely damaging attack on Hull youngsters who want to better themselves.
Lib Dem councillor McCobb asserts that I haven't supported Lord Heseltine's regeneration proposals. This is another blatant Lib Dem lie. I have repeatedly backed this initiative and two of my criticisms of the Budget last week were that the Government is not fully accepting enough of Lord Heseltine's 89 proposals and that the promised new pot of regeneration funding will not appear until 2015. Hull needs this investment now.
By voting for every single George Osborne Budget since 2010, the Lib Dems must share in the blame for turning the growing economy that the coalition inherited in 2010 into one that has now flat-lined for two years – and for the 1,200 private sector jobs that Hull lost this winter alone.
In conclusion, I'm sure the Fair Deal for Hull campaign will chime with local people, who can back it at http://
epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/45719
As a city, we must stand united in opposition to the unfair distribution of funding cuts from this Government.
Given their grim record, not having support from Hull's Lib Dems can only serve to enhance the credibility of our campaign to get a fair deal for Hull.
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