Political Inspiration 

Throughout my 1980’s childhood in Lib/Con Worthing, I was always interested in elections, Government and local democracy and I followed with interest the SDP/Liberal Alliance.  In 1987 my family moved to Clymping, near Littlehampton.  After the botched SDP-Liberal merger, the Liberal Democrats were the only party proposing to replace the Poll Tax with a local income tax. The Soviet Union was collapsing and people all over Europe were being freed from the bonds of Socialism. Thatcher had gone and there seemed to me, only one alternative to the excesses of Thatcherism and the control of Socialism -  Paddy Ashdown’s Liberal Democrats.

Joined the party

November 1990 at the age of 15, I joined the Liberal Democrats.  The local group were fairly quick to get in touch, but all the meetings and activities seemed to be in Bognor Regis, which was a town I never identified with, so I never got the chance to get involved. In 1992, John Major’s embattled government called a general election for April. The local party opened a campaign shop in Littlehampton and I soon became involved in the election campaign.  After the depressing 1992 election result I attended the local party AGM, (in Bognor!!) and joined the local party committee at the age of 17, with a determination to start some activity in Littlehampton. 

Littlehampton Branch

In the summer of 1993, I had a short list of party members for Littlehampton and wrote to them asking if any of them wanted to start an active Littlehampton Branch of the party. I had two replies, from Dave Sax and Paul Graydon, and with some other local members I had met or recruited, started Littlehampton Branch meetings and activities for the first time since the SDP/Liberal merger. In October 1993, the branch paid for our first non-election Focus newsletter, we had a massive response from the “join the winning team” tear-off slip, and recruited a lot of members including Nick Wiltshire and Barbara Roberts. In 1995, we had our first real electoral test in the shape of the local elections; we could only financially and practically support one target ward. We chose Central ward, Dave Sax and David Jones were District and Town candidates and Nick Wiltshire stood for the Town Council. I was too young to stand myself (being 7 months short of the required 21 years old) so was agent. Dave Sax comfortably won a Town Council seat.  By early 1996 the New Labour bandwagon was rolling along, I became very depressed. I couldn’t understand why the media and public were being taken in by this man, added to the fact that more and more of my time seemed to be taken up with party activities. It seemed that I was missing out on being a normal 21 year old. So I stepped back from active party duty and the Littlehampton Branch collapsed soon afterwards.

Councillor Foster

In 1999, I was contacted by the local party and asked if I wanted to be a candidate in the upcoming local elections. I reluctantly said I would stand for Town Council and was soon convinced to do the lot. I stood with Barbara Roberts and Paul Graydon. The result was dreadful; I won a town seat with Barbara tying with the Labour candidate. She lost the draw. And so I became a reluctant councillor on a Labour council and no Littlehampton branch or team to support me.  By the summer of 2001, personal problems, lack of local party support and a terrible government that seemed invincible I was very demoralised and in March 2002, I resigned from the Council with a vow to exact my revenge on the Labour party one day.  I watched with interest the 2003 local elections from the comfort of my own home. 

Back again!

The general election of 2005, gave me an opportunity to renew my lapsed party membership and offer my moral support to the local group. Over the following months I became more involved with the local party and by the summer of 2006 agreed to be the Littlehampton election agent for the 2007 local election, my chance to smash the Littlehampton Labour Party. By late 2006, everything seemed to be in place. Ian Buckland had made an impression on us the first time we met him and it soon became clear that we could almost run a full slate of candidates. The local election campaign went very well under my management, we doubled our Littlehampton representation on Arun District Council. (I was lucky to lose by 4 votes!) Labour really suffered, losing 5 town council seats and 4 district council seats. I feel I have made up for my shameful resignation in 2002.