Three things that need to change in politics in this next parliament

There's a lot said in a political campaign and certainly I've written and spoke my fair share. On ideas and policies that matter to me. But my ability to pick out a bad policy and build an argument about it is not a reason to elect me. If that logic ran true it'd be Owen Jones fending off coalition advances, but that's not true.

Electing an MP is about electing someone for their ideals, policies and principles but also electing an individual to represent them both in terms of policy and in terms of locality. I'd happily be an MP at the heart of the debate, trying to hold reason, sending constant missives to the press on how I'm right and everyone else is wrong.  But that's not enough, being a talker and thinker is great but we also need a doer and someone with an eye not just for high politics but an eye to the grass roots. 

I've tried to be this way with my blog, I often write and campaign about lofty ideals, devolution, privatisation, austerity and so on. In between those times I've  campaigned on specific issues. Against the pasty tax and Devonwall. For Superfast Broadband in Penzance town centre. For government investment and attention in Wave Hub, among others. I don't pretend for a minute that it was me alone that shifted these issues. I do feel however I can take credit for inspiring debate and getting the situation into the media and further up the political agenda.

I guess my personal plea to you is this, I feel I can have an impact, I feel that I already do. I've had this impact as a blogger, a tweeter and more recently as a town councillor. If I have a bigger mandate from thursday's vote, I will have more influence and more people will take note of me. More importantly than all of that pay more attention to Cornwall and the issues MK has raised time and again in this election, the failures of centralisation, our poorly performing economy, our low wages and Cornwall's affordable housing need. The opportunities of rethinking politics, having the chance to set our own, new, priorities in Cornwall, the chance that by doing things differently Cornwall can be a better place to live, work and play.

I've raised these three truths at this election a number of times, 1. we don't get fair funding for our public services in Cornwall, 2. the St Ives constituency has the lowest wages in Cornwall, 3. Cornwall is one of the poorest parts of Western Europe. Tory, Lib Dem and Labour have had a chance to sort these out and they haven't. I think the time has come to change that, we must change that. The more of a vote I and Mebyon Kernow get on thursday, the more of a say, MK can have in getting the focus of political minds to address Cornwall's fundamental problems head on and unlock the brighter future that we all know is possible. 

Waitrose management think it's "correct" to use an English flag for Cornish fish

There's been image circulating social media for a few weeks now, of Cornish sardines (pilchards) displayed with an English flag, along with the caption "spot the mistake". It's something I'd not noticed until this week, so I asked them on twitter why it wasn't a Cornish flag (as did many others on their facebook page and twitter). The same stock answer came back for ease of identification an English flag is used, any questioning of this was answered with a stony silence. I even asked their twitter operator if they knew what a Cornish flag looked like, no reply. 

The customer is always right unless their Cornish?

So I sought a more considered response and some dialogue, so I emailed their ceo. Explaining Cornish pride in our flag and our food. I also pointed out the significance of the quality of Cornish produce and that Waitrose should take pride in that.  I pointed out the trend toward labelling the origin of food and it's food miles.  All good arguments,  I believe for displaying Cornish food as Cornish.

Anyway here's the reply I received to my email a  few days ago,  it's a very token response and didn't address any of my points. Any thoughts to what my response should be?

Dear Mr Simmons

Thank you for your patience while I looked into this matter.

I’ve contacted Jeremy Langley, our fish buyer with your enquiry. He’s advised that the use of national flags was introduced to help our customers to quickly identify UK produced fish and shellfish. We decided to use national rather than the regional flags as these are more easily recognised by our Customers.  Cornwall is recognised as a county of England within the United Kingdom and therefore the use of the English flag to denote Cornish sourced product is correct.

We appreciate your thoughts on this matter but I’m afraid at this stage we haven’t got any plans to change our current labelling of our fish.  We do hope despite this, we can look forward to seeing you in our stores again soon.

Yours sincerely

D Lamont (Miss)
Case Manager, Executive Office