There are four local matters about which I am especially concerned.

I will go on giving my total support to the preservation and development of the wonderful service provided by the Pershore Community Hospital.

I will continue to do what I can to ensure that schools in Worcestershire have a fairer share of the national education budget.

The Conservative policy of funding schools directly will bypass the existing unfair formula for allocating money to education. I will do my very best to help farmers and associated rural businesses back onto their feet.

This will be helped by reforming the European Common Agricultural Policy. I will also keep up pressure for better flood protection measures around the Severn and Avon. Nationally it would be an astonishing irony if Labour were to benefit from the strong economy Conservatives left behind when it is a Labour Government which, by imposing £5 billion new taxes and 3,865 new regulations on industry, is running the economy down. The economy is getting weaker. A record £7.7 billion balance of payments deficit for the first three months of this year is evidence of this, as is the collapse over the last three years of Britain's competitive ranking from fourth in the world to ninth. Just as Labour, with Liberal support, began the process of breaking up our country, so it is wrecking the economy.