Eastleigh North Ward candidates video hustings

[7s] Who are you and why are heavily invested in the area.

[26s] For my sins, I'm also an East season ticket holder.

[29s] And yeah, standing because I am very concerned about the direction of travel in this country.

[35s] I think that change obviously will have to come through a general election, but the local elections are an important building block towards that.

[42s] Change.

[44s] In particular, very concern about a level of debt and the finances that are being accumulated by local authorities and not just in tax and other bills

[58s] and the types of services that we receive because, you know, I don't know about you, but I'm noticing some pretty steep rises since I've moved here.

[65s] And, for me, the services are at least plateauing or getting worse.

[70s] What's one transport change you would prioritize locally and where?

[76s] For me I would actually prioritize the Bishop Stoke Road corridor.

[81s] So we're regular users ourselves of this corridor children who go to one of my, my son and my soon to be both sons who could go just called Pharaoh.

[91s] The area around Riverside and Chickenhall Lane can get quite congested in the mornings and it's quite a key artery.

[98s] So I would like to see improvement to that, you know, more practical measures, maybe things like.

[105s] I think there was talk at one stage of a kind of bypass or something, which was going to come off Chicken Hall Lane.

[113s] But also as well, I feel the quality of the roads is really, really poor in some of those areas.

[117s] And you could actually encounter quite a lot of danger, especially if you're a motorcyclist or even in a car.

[127s] It can be pretty ropey.

[129s] Where would you spend more and what would cut to pay for it?

[134s] Thinking about spending money is the easy part, but it's how are you going to raise it?

[138s] And at the moment, the County Council's finances are not in a great shape.

[142s] I think it is not unreasonable to say that.

[144s] And I did read the financial report for the county council recently.

[149s] And it looks like to me that the council has dipped into reserves and is now looking at quite a steep council tax rise in the next couple of years to try

[160s] and plug the gaps which exist.

[162s] And of course, we're aware that some of that comes from the need to provide social care and support services, but there is potentially some work that we

[175s] do in terms of maybe looking at some of the contracts and ways to try and reduce some overhead that could be in term of bureaucracy.

[183s] The whole question about what you would spend money on, I think we've got to get the current situation under control and then we can start to invest in things.

[191s] One last call.

[192s] Anything you'd like to say?

[195s] So, I think to sort of sum up my experiences really in governance and legal and financial matters, and I would hope to be able to offer that experience

[208s] in council if I were elected to try and, you know, highlight the improvements that could be made in those areas.

[214s] And it's not always exciting.

[216s] I get it.

[216s] It can be quite a dry topic.

[219s] but I'm used to dealing with that stuff in my professional life and that could be genuinely useful.