Clive Easton, a former airline pilot, is married with one son.
A. The priority has to be to assist farmers to stay in farming, that is their love and their life.
The UKIP favours direct Government assistance for marketing all farm produce, the establishment of farmers' retail outlets and payment breaks from VAT and rates until recovery has been made after re-stocking on lifestock farms who lost animals due to foot-and-mouth.
For those diversifying in non-core areas, assistance schemes are a nightmare - rural recovery business funds, the small firms guarantee scheme and the inconsistency of rate relief where in Wales, for example, 100 per cent is available for rateable value up to £50,000 but only 75 per cent for rateable value above £12,000 is available in England.
These schemes and others have to be rationalised together and made easier to access. Farmers do not need another mass of paperwork.
B. The UKIP believes in true representation democracy.
All traffic alleviation schemes, their pluses and minuses have to be explained and the majority of opinion sought before proceeding.
We have to plan for future expansion. Failure to do so will only visit the next generation with the same problem and therefore return to belated knee-jerk reactions rather than a visionary plan dove-tailed to a clear objective for at least 25 years ahead.
This includes road widening, one-way systems, a second river crossing, new mass transit system, the bypass and a combination of one or more of these. However, despite the real environmental problems that a bypass would cause in the Golden and Lugg valleys, I believe, on balance, a bypass is necessary.
C. In the long-term the community as a whole needs to work in a more co-ordinated way so that through education and example we inculcate into the following generations a pride in and respect for our community.
In the short-term, the rights of the victim rather than the offender must be highlighted. In non-serious offences punishment should require an offender to work for or compensate victims in preference to custodial sentences.
This should help in the rehabilitation of the offender when confronted with the distress caused. The police must also adopt a zero tolerance approach. It is the mark of a civilised society that neither crime nor abusive behaviour towards anyone is acceptable.
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