15/04/2010
Ross,
Skye &
Lochaber
Conservatives
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Make
2010 the
Year of
Change
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can help make it happen!
PRESS RELEASE
Its the Conservatives that have the
interests of Rural Scotland at the
heart of their philosophy.
Exposing the hypocrisy of the Lib Dems, Labour and SNP
Thursday 15th April 2010
Lib Dems, Labour and SNP block further relief for small and rural businesses
Conservative plans to offer further relief from business rates for small businesses and rural petrol stations, hotels and post offices were voted down today by Lib Dem, Labour and SNP MSPs. A Conservative plan for the Scottish Government to use ‘buoyancy’ in business rate revenues to extend rate reliefs for rural petrol stations, hotels and post offices, as well as small businesses, was blocked by the other parties.
Derek Brownlee MSP, Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Finance & Sustainable Growth, says:
"The Lib Dems have been rumbled on business rates. Yesterday they announced plans which would see bills soar in Aberdeenshire, the Borders, East Dunbartonshire and Argyll & Bute, amongst others. Today, along with the other parties, they have prevented help for petrol stations, post offices and hotels affected by the revaluation. They have been crying crocodile tears over business rate increases. Today they had the opportunity to help rural businesses but instead they decided to prevent any help being offered.
“The vote came after it emerged that a Lib Dem plan to keep the business rate increases - but phase them in - would costat least £195m - three times what the party had claimed. A debate in the Scottish Parliament also heard how the Lib Dems
had backed plans to spend additional money from the UK Government on affordable housing - despite calling today for the
same money to be used to fund business rate cuts.”
BY DONALD CAMERON
Scottish Conservative candidate for Ross, Skye and Lochaber
Donald Cameron launches his campaign…
Now that the election is confirmed for May 6th, Donald Cameron, Scottish Conservative candidate for Ross, Skye & Lochaber has officially launched his election campaign.
Donald said: “In this General Election, I believe that a new Conservative government will be elected to bring about real change in this country. And we need new political leadership here in Ross, Skye and Lochaber too.
Over the last few years, I have travelled right across this very large constituency talking to voters about their concerns. There are many issues, and here are just a few that people have spoken to me about:
- Our crumbling road infrastructure, in particular the poor condition of the A9, A82 and A87, not to mention smaller routes.
- The madness of tighter EU regulation faced by our farmers and fishermen.
- Care for the elderly.
- Access to broadband internet – whilst there have been some improvements, there are still many parts of the Highlands without sufficient coverage.
I want to work together with others to bring about a positive effect on people’s quality of life. We now all have the chance to bring about the change Britain so desperately needs. We all have an important role to play in bringing about that change. So I’m asking people to be part of it!
I believe that only the Conservatives can take this country in a new direction which is why I hope people will support me at the polls.
And I am optimistic that the next few years will be a time of hope and lasting achievement in Ross, Skye & Lochaber.”
You can visit Donald’s website at www.donald-cameron.co.uk. You can also follow Donald on Facebook and Twitter; you can read his blog which details campaign activities; and you can comment and ask questions.
Visit Donald Cameron's New Web Site
Mary Scanlon
Prime agricultural land must be safeguarded for farming, not housing
Speaking today at General Questions on the use of prime agricultural land for housing developments in the Highlands, Mary Scanlon, Conservative MSP for Highlands and Islands, said:
"I highlighted two recent housing developments in the Highlands which have been given approval despite being on prime agricultural land: Ness Gap at Fortrose on the Black Isle which is grade1 agricultural land and the Tornagrain development on the A96 corridor which is also on prime agricultural land previously used to grow cereals."
"I asked the Minister, given that food security and self-sustainability remain important issues to future food production in Scotland, what assurances can the Scottish Government give that planning policies will be re-examined in order that agricultural land is safeguarded for agricultural use?"
"The Minister responded by assuring me that the recently consolidated Scottish Planning Policy will be taking a stronger line on this issue, which I very much welcome. He also assured me that in the Land Use Strategy, under the Climate Change Act, the matter of planning on prime agricultural land will be keenly taken account of."
"Prime agricultural land must be safeguarded for farming to ensure Scotland can provide for itself and future generations. Increasingly we import food from across the globe, which is more expensive and less environmentally friendly."
DONALD CAMERON
May: Rise in Scottish unemployment figures should be a wake up call for Labour
Gordon Brown's debt. Hasn't it grown?
14/12/2009
Gordon Brown's debt. Hasn't it
grown?
Annabel Goldie MSP, Scottish Conservative Leader:
Unveiled this poster in
Edinburgh today
£23,000 – What every man, woman and child now owes in Gordon
Brown’s Britain
Conservatives have launched a new poster highlighting the £6,000
rise in national debt for every person in the past year. Everyone in the UK now
owes £23,000 – up from £17,000 a year ago.
Speaking as she unveiled the poster in Edinburgh today, Annabel Goldie MSP,
Scottish Conservative Leader, said:
"For over a year the Conservatives have said that the national debt is crucial
to turning round the economy. Now everyone agrees.
“We made a huge deal of it with the baby poster we all remember.
“But since then it's got worse, and the Government still has no credible plan to
deal with it.
“It will be £23,000 for everyone in our country - every man, woman and child.
That's £6000 more than this time last year.
“And if we don't deal with it – which is the Labour approach - it will mean
higher taxes and higher interest rates for everyone."
In response to the Chancellor’s Pre-budget report,
George Osborne MP, Shadow Chancellor
of the Exchequer, said:
PS: Since this statement was made in December 2009, the debt has now risen to
£28000 per head.
The price we all have to pay for Labour's incompetence!
(Scottish Conservative candidate for Ross, Skye and Lochaber)
Congratulations to Fort William on being awarded over £317, 000
Donald Cameron, Scottish Conservative candidate for Ross, Skye and Lochaber, offered Fort William his warm congratulations after the town was awarded £317, 400 in the final tranche of Town Centre Regeneration funding just released.
Donald said: “It was the Scottish Conservatives who secured £60 million in the last budget for town centre regeneration across Scotland, and I am especially delighted that my home town of Fort William has benefited from the scheme. While the economic situation is still very uncertain, we believe that we are the party of local communities and small business in the Highlands, and we are the party providing the boost at a local level to help Scotland weather the worst of Labour’s recession.”
For further information contact:
Scottish Conservatives - Highlands & Islands Office: 14 Ardross Street, Inverness IV3 5NS.
Tel/Fax: 01463 233 986.
E-Mail: rosskyeconservatives@tory.org.
Web Site: www.rosskye.tories.org.uk
Out and About with
Donald Cameron
Visiting
the Black Isle Show, Thursday 6th August Donald
Cameron has a
powerful message for Highland farmers and crofters.
(Donald
speaking to local business men Frank Nicol Farm & Garden)
The farming industry is vital to the country’s economy and to the environment. Farmers must be able to compete in a truly open market and receive fair prices for their high quality locally produced food.
Donald, highlighted the need to reverse the serious decline in livestock numbers and in milk production.
Milk prices, for instance, have risen in the shops
by 14% with no corresponding benefit to farmers.
Conservatives aim to reduce the
nation’s dependence on imports for over 35% of our food by
pro-active support for the industry.
( We must grow more from our own resources)
The Highland farmers must be freed from excessive regulations and bureaucratic interference.
As a
Conservative, Donald considers that it is essential to retain and increase
the production of high grade agricultural land. With an open market and
fair pricing a more viable and sustainable farming industry can develop,
providing a quality livelihood for the younger farming generation. 
Donald at the NFU stand: NFU President Jim Maclaren. Jamie McGrigor MSP and Frank Spencer Nairn
Electronic Tagging of sheep - stop this EU LUNACY
Farmers and crofters will be outraged at the latest impractical, one-size-fits-all, EU policy that the government are set to implement here, compulsory electronic tagging of sheep. The cost of this will be huge: estimated at £3,000 extra per year for a farmer with 1000 ewes.
All we need to do here in the Highlands
is to move sheep on a batch basis through markets and between farms.
An electronic tag is simply unnecessary. Current tags include the
UK herd number and are quite adequate and cost-effective, as well as
being efficient in practice.
Donald visiting the SRPBA
stand
along with Mary Scanlon MSP and Jamie McGrigor MSP.
pictured here along with SRPBA members.
(Scottish Rural Property & Business Association)
At this point in time, with livestock figures declining at an alarming rate and when the outlook for farming is threatened by some very real financial pressures, the LAST thing our crofters and farmers could do with is a needless, costly and bureaucratic system such as this.
Please help the Scottish Conservatives fight it!
From the
office of
MARY SCANLON MSP
Highlands and Islands
Dingwall
gets £462,900 from Scottish Conservatives Town Centre Regeneration
Fund
"I am delighted that Dingwall has secured £462,900 in the first tranche of
the Town Centre Regeneration Fund allocations. This fund was secured by the
Scottish Conservatives in the Scottish Parliament. Labour and the Lib Dems
voted against it and Alex Salmond only agreed to it as a result of Scottish
Conservative pressure. I think it is a shame the SNP Government did not
think other Highland towns were worth giving the money to. However, there
is still money left in the fund and I think local communities should try
again. As a result of Labour's recession we need this money to help local
businesses and the community as a whole."
Scottish
Conservatives working for you!
The independence party is over, now SNP must get on with governing |
|
Commenting after the Scottish Parliament
voted against holding an independence referendum in the lifetime of this
session,
Annabel Goldie MSP,
Scottish Conservative & Unionist Party Leader, said: “The SNP cupboard is bare. The last vestige of a flagship policy has been shot to pieces. “Local income tax was ditched when the SNP lost a non-binding vote by five. Today they have been comprehensively mauled – losing by 25 votes. This in effect was the Stage 1 of a referendum bill. Now the Scottish Government needs to move on and deal with the real and pressing issues of the day, such as Labour’s recession and Scotland’s broken society.  “By
the SNP’s own benchmark, this issue is dead. On the Politics Show last
Sunday, Mike Russell said: ‘You don’t know if there is a parliamentary
majority until there is a vote’. Well, there has been a vote and the SNP has
lost it big time. It is time for the SNP to admit the party is over, to drop
its independence obsession and to get on with being a devolved government in
Scotland.” |
Out and About with Donald Cameron
Fortrose Cathedral on the Black Isle.
Donald Cameron (Westminster Parliamentary Candidate for Ross Skye and Lochaber Constituency) with John Scott and Jo Clements visiting Fortrose on a fact finding tour of the problems of small rural businesses in the Highlands.
Donald emphasised that the Conservatives at the Scottish Parliament were instrumental securing funding for the regeneration of the High Streets in Rural Scotland.
“Donald spent Monday 16th February campaigning across the Black Isle, from Fortrose to North Kessock and Kilmuir. After meeting with a representative of the fishing industry in Avoch, Donald visited several businesses in Fortrose, and met the voters face to face on the High Street there while a team of supporters assisted with leafleting. In the afternoon, Donald visited the Fortrose Leisure Centre and met many of the staff and management who showed him around the impressive facilities. Donald said: “We got a great welcome from the people of the Black Isle. Many of them are clearly worried about the economic situation: the Scottish Conservatives are the party of local communities and small business in the Highlands, and we are the party providing the boost at a local level to help Scotland weather the worst of Labour’s recession.”
For more information go to
TO SAC (The Scottish Agricultural College) ANNUAL DINNER
Murdo Fraser:
speaking to the Association
on Saturday the 25th October in Strathpeffer.
Report to follow:
Mary Scanlon: Tory Plans To Cut Fuel Costs By £100 Per Year
Mary Scanlon: SNP Alcohol Plan; Government by Gimmick!
Struan Stevenson MEP on
An External Common Policy for Energy
Scottish Conservative Deputy
Leader: Murdo Fraser M.S.P.
calls for halt to all New
Wind Farm Plans
DONALD CAMERON
(Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for ROSS, SKYE & LOCHABER)
“The Scottish Conservatives’ inaugural Highlands
and Islands conference in Inverness on Saturday was a great success and was
attended by party activists from across the region including many from Ross,
Skye & Lochaber.
Annabel Goldie, Scottish Conservative leader,
said in her excellent speech to the conference that: ‘With Labour mired in
failure, and the Liberal Democrats off the radar screen, voters may think that
using the SNP as some kind of protest vote or tartan insurance policy at
Westminster is an option. It is not. Voting SNP for Westminster is stamping Alex Salmond’s passport to independence. But it still leaves Gordon Brown in office.
David Cameron and the Scottish Conservatives have demonstrated that they can
make the Scottish Parliament work to improve Scotland. At Westminster, he can
deliver the exciting policies of sharing economic growth with families, finding
a route to providing affordable homes and emphasising a new social agenda for
the 21st century.’
More
( Donald with Annabel Goldie )
Donald Cameron Hits Out at the Decline in Scottish Agriculture
Donald at Dingwall Mart →
Enough is enough.
Twenty five years ago the Liberals won this Constituency from the Conservatives. A genial young man won the seat, and went on to become Liberal Party Leader. However, after all this time, we have to ask ourselves what the Constituency has gained from being Liberal, precious little.
Donald Cameron from Lochaber was
selected as the
Scottish Conservative & Unionist Party’s Parliamentary Candidate for this
constituency at a very well attended meeting held at the Strathpeffer
Community Centre on Friday 15th February 2008.
Donald Cameron
is a member of a family that has been well known and
respected in the Lochaber area for many generations. He currently
practises as an advocate in Edinburgh, but his family home and roots are
in Lochaber within the constituency.
Ross Skye &
Lochaber is the largest constituency in the country equivalent in size to
almost 1/3 of
Jack Brooker What being a Conservative means to the younger generation
A YOUNG VOICE
This is a good moment to consider what being a Conservative means to someone of my generation.
I support the party’s policies on law and order, a strong national defence and free enterprise. But there is a deeper conservative philosophy, which is a firm belief in the liberty of the individual. It was a Conservative Prime Minister whose Reform Bill of 1867 gave the vote to the ‘common man’ despite Liberal opposition.
Before and after World War II Conservative Prime Ministers made tough choices on disarmament, appeasement and intimidation by vested interests in the face of Labour opposition. So fostering peoples’ aspirations, guaranteeing personal liberty and the right to have a stake in society.
These liberties are now under attack! Free enterprise threatened by an expanded bureaucracy, excessive taxation to finance headline catching ‘initiatives’ and surrendering to the powers of the unelected EU commissioners.
It is time, once again, to stand up for our free society and genuine devolvement of power to the private citizen. Our deep belief in liberty sets us apart from our opponents for it is a principle which remains true as lesser ideologies come and go with the political tide.
Our opponents may
come up with a good sound bite from time to time but, so long as we maintain our
commitment to the freedom of the individual, Conservatives will always hold the
moral high ground. Jack Brooker
(aged 18 years)
2005 General Election Results
The May 2005 Election results for our constituency were
particularly encouraging from a
Conservative
point of view, in that we were able to push the S.N.P. into fourth place.
This shows that there is everything to play for in the 2007 Scottish
Parliamentary
Elections.
| Scottish Liberal Democrats | 19100 |
| Scottish Labour Party | 4851 |
| Scottish Conservatives & Unionist Party | 3275 |
| Scottish National Party | 3119 |
| Scottish Green Party | 1097 |
| UK Independence Party | 500 |
| Scottish Socialist Party | 412 |
| Independent | 184 |
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