Message from Ray Earwicker On behalf of Bracknell Liberal Democrats

1.39.30pm BST (GMT +0100) Mon 10th May 2010

On behalf of Bracknell Liberal Democrats may I thank all those who voted for me and helped us achieve our best ever electoral result in the Bracknell constituency on 6 May.

Even with the slender resources at our disposal we continued to make considerable progress and it is clear the Liberal Democrats are now the main opposition to the Conservatives in the Bracknell constituency. Despite the best efforts of a large part of the national Press to vilify our policies on Trident, Europe and immigration, we still managed to increase our share of the vote by 4.5% and gain a 1% swing from the Conservatives.

The General Election, however, highlighted yet again the discrepancy that continues to exist between votes cast and seats won. Nearly 7m people voted for the Liberal Democrats nationally, an increase of nearly a million, yet the number of seats that we actually won fell to 57. Labour on the other hand saw its vote fall heavily to 8.6m, yet it still managed to hold on to 258 seats!

The hung Parliament should give added weight to calls to change the current grossly unfair electoral system. Coalitions and even minority governments can work and often do provide 'strong government' in many parts of the world. The absence of an overall majority for any one Party also means that the national interest, rather than party interests, is much more likely to be served.

The prospects for gaining a fairer composition of members on Bracknell Forest Council in 2011 also appears a little brighter, following the general election result. I would urge any resident who is fed up with the empty promises, the lack of progress and the general decline in the state of public services to come forward and either join us or support us in next year's local elections. Together we can try and get things moving again.

Bracknell deserves better; it is time for yet more change!

Ray Earwicker

Bracknell Liberal Democrats