CLEGG TACKLES KEY CONCERNS AT PUBLIC MEETING

8.27.00pm BST (GMT +0100) Mon 14th Jul 2008

Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg took centre stage for an open question and answer session at the Forum Theatre in Malvern last Thursday.

Local parliamentary candidate, Richard Burt said he was delighted that so many people took an active part in the event.

"In an age when most people get their politics from the television, it was heartening to see around 300 people engaged in a lively debate on a wide range of topics important to local people.

"This was a genuinely open event, with no hand picked audience, no planted questions and no spin."

Questions ranged from the need for respite care and better mental health services, which he said were chronically under-funded, to the treatment of asylum seekers, who he said were "desperate human beings", protected under international law, and should be dealt with "efficiently and fairly" by an independent body instead of "inefficiently and cruelly" by government agencies.

Responding to complaints about council services, he said that more money should be raised locally by councils with a corresponding reduction in money raised by national taxation, giving more control to local people. He said the unfair Council Tax should be scrapped and replaced with a local income tax to raise money for local services.

Mr Clegg also condemned the government's "cynical" post office closure programme and called on Gordon Brown to float just under half of the Royal Mail on the stock exchange, raising £2billion to invest in the post office network.

The discussion also ranged across Europe, the Environment, fuel prices, flooding and Iraq and lasted for an hour and a half.

Mr Clegg has already spoken to over thirty audiences and will continue this dialogue around the country to help reconnect politics with people.