"It's the beginning of the end for Hampshire's public library service"

Commenting on today's announcement that the Conservative-run Hampshire County Council is planning to close up to 14 of Hampshire's libraries, Liberal Democrat Councillor Alan Dowden said:

"These closure plans mark the beginning of the end for Hampshire's public library service.

The key events in my Borough year are the start of the Ashfield Development process, which was one of the main motivations for standing again in the Tadburn Borough and Town elections in 2019; the stunning local election results on the 2nd May; the takeover of Southern Area Planning Committee by the Liberal Democrats and finding myself Deputy Test Valley Borough Mayor.

Today kickstarts an important week in Parliament, with votes taking place on key amendments to the Withdrawal Agreement Bill, tabled by Liberal Democrats.

In our fight to hold this Conservative Government to account on its Brexit agenda, we are fighting to protect EU citizens' rights as well as those of unaccompanied child refugees.

The Liberal Democrats have today led tributes following the death of Lord Robert Maclennan.

Lord Robert Maclennan of Rogart, known as Bob Maclennan, was the last leader of the Social Democrat Party before it merged with the Liberal Party. He then became joint interim leader of the new party.

Bob Maclennan was a Member of Parliament from 1966 to 2001. Upon stepping down as MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, Bob Maclennan was elevated to the House of Lords.

At a meeting of the Federal Board today, the new board made decisions on three key events, the timeline for our upcoming leadership election, the timeline for upcoming elections to party posts and committees and finally the appointment of a Chair of the Election Review and a timetable for that.

Jump to: Leadership Election | Internal Elections | Election review

Do you think we care well enough for the more vulnerable in our society?

Have we figured out how best to care for people who've experienced bereavement, people who get ill in old age, those with mental ill-health or adults with learning disabilities?

My own personal experience tells me we haven't. Whether in my own life or for many constituents in my advice surgeries over 20 years, all too often the care and support systems either don't work well enough or aren't even there at all.

I want to thank you for all your hard work over the last six weeks. Everyone did everything they could in this campaign but the result has been deeply disappointing.

Despite Liberal Democrats gaining 1.2m votes and our share of the vote increasing in every region of the UK, we are now one seat down compared to 2017. Under a proportional system, we would now have 84 MPs.

The latest EU Settlement Scheme Statistics, published by the Home Office, show more than 140,000 EU citizens applied to live and work in the UK after Brexit in November.

These figures show 361,900 people are still waiting for a decision, with 2,592,800 applications received but only 2,230,900 concluded.

This news is yet more evidence that Boris Johnson's government looks set to crash our economy thanks to his disastrous Brexit plans.

Whether its putting people's livelihoods on the line in our factory sector, or increasing prices with the pound weakening in 2020, it is clear that Boris Johnson's promise to unleash Britain's potential is nothing more than empty rhetoric.

We haven't even left yet.

Boris Johnson's government has set out a disastrous agenda which will force through a hard Brexit, undermine our public services, destroy opportunities for our communities and cripple living standards.

Brexit will hinder our ability to safeguard our NHS and reduce our capacity to tackle the climate crisis.

The fact that radical climate action has been ignored is a hallmark of a government which is setting all the wrong priorities.