Exeter will miss its target to become a carbon neutral city by 2030 unless emissions reduce significantly, a new report by the city council’s CEO reveals.
The building sector has the highest emissions (35 per cent) followed by power (24 per cent) and transport (22 per cent). Levels from each of the remaining sectors are seven per cent or less.
The council declared a climate emergency in 2019 and pledged to work towards creating a net zero city by 2030. The target is 20 years in advance of the 2050 target set nationally.
Since January, its chief executive Karime Hassan has also been working on the city’s carbon neutral goal at Exeter City Futures, a community interest company.
Exeter currently produces just under half a million tonnes of carbon dioxide (equivalent) per year, according to a report by Mr Hassan to a council scrutiny committee, a reduction of around a third since 2008.
The report outlines how reaching the target by 2030 requires a “much greater reduction” in emissions and says significant private investment will be needed, well in excess of what the council can afford on its own.
The drop in emissions in Exeter since 2008, when they were estimated at 717 thousand tonnes of CO2, is due to ‘grid decarbonisation’ – moving away from fossil fuels like coal – which has taken place outside Exeter.
However, the current level of reducing emissions because of grid decarbonisation will not continue. Even if it did, Exeter would still be producing 291,000 tonnes of CO2 in 2030 based on current trends – “nowhere near net zero,” the report says.
Local sector reductions in buildings and transport emissions have failed to even meet previous targets set in 2007, with a lack of progress in these areas described as “particularly concerning.”
The building sector has the highest emissions (35 per cent) followed by power (24 per cent) and transport (22 per cent). Levels from each of the remaining sectors are seven per cent or less.
The document says: “Growth in the city is leading to increases in emissions and the decarbonisation of electricity cannot continue to make up for the shortfalls in these sectors. The city needs to make significant progress in buildings and transport to deliver net zero.”
Emissions from Exeter’s buildings have “hardly changed since 2008,” it adds, with almost half of the city’s homes estimated to still need more loft insulation.
Exeter has a target of 42,200 homes to be powered by heat pumps by 2030, as gas boilers are phased out, but only 449 homes currently have such a heating system.
Emissions from transport remain “stubbornly high,” the report says, stating that huge increases in electric car ownership, charging points and active travel (walking and cycling) will be needed to meet the 2030 target.
Reductions in waste emissions have also failed to materialise, with levels described as being “similar over the past four years.”
The UK’s carbon budget – a set of national targets enshrined in law – includes increasing recycling rates to 70 per cent by 2030. However, Exeter is way off meeting this target.
Just 28 per cent of the city’s waste was recycled in 2020/21 – a figure slammed as “appalling” earlier this year by one councillor who criticised the lack of a universal food waste collection service.
Kerbside collections are being be rolled out, but not particularly quickly. Currently Alphington only has access to the service, meaning most of the city’s unwanted food ends up in general rubbish. Exeter residents still have to take glass to bottle banks if they want them to be recycled, unlike most of Devon.
The council blames vehicle and driver shortages for the delays.
In the report, a senior officer says the carbon reduction findings explain “in stark terms the challenges to deliver net zero. From a financial point of view, the scale of investment required is far in excess of that which the council can afford.”
They added the authority “set aside £1 million a year ago in order to provide some resource to the project, but this in itself is clearly a tiny fraction of what is required.”
Despite this, the report concludes it is “broadly understood” what needs to be done to make Exeter carbon neutral. This includes replacing all gas boilers with heat pumps, replacing all fossil fuel cars with electric ones, producing more renewable energy from extra solar panels, retrofitting homes, improving recycling rates and “massively” increasing cycling.
“There are plenty of political, financial, legal, technical and supply chain reasons why this may be extremely challenging to deliver by 2030,” it warns, but adds there will be “opportunities for the local economy, investment, labour demand, and innovation in technology.”
A by-election deep in once-safe Conservative territory threatens to upend British politics. For the parties fighting it, the stakes are huge – but they’re picking their battles in very different ways.
It’s a hot summer morning in mid-Devon and Kayleigh Diggle stands in the bookshop she runs, feeling conflicted. The 32-year-old, who normally supports the Greens, is annoyed with the Conservative government and is considering a tactical vote for the Liberal Democrats. But the sheer relentlessness of latter’s campaign makes her recoil.
“It’s their constant leafleting,” says Kayleigh. She’s sick, too, of looking at the party’s Day-Glo yellow-and-black diamond-shaped posters (“Winning here!”) everywhere she goes. “It’s very, very, over-the-top.”
Voters in Tiverton and Honiton aren’t used to anyone having to fight quite this hard for their votes.
Kayleigh Diggle
Sprawling from the fringes of Exmoor to a stretch of the Jurassic Coast, this cluster of villages and market towns was seen until recently as an extremely safe Conservative seat.
Then erstwhile MP Neil Parish admitted watching pornography in Parliament after, by his own account, searching online for tractors.
Now there’s a by-election to replace him. Partygate, turmoil on the Tory benches and the cost of living crisis have made the 23 June vote a crucial test of the public’s mood.
And with another by-election taking place on the same day in the northern “Red Wall” battleground of Wakefield, Tiverton and Honiton has been tasked with delivering an interim verdict from the Tories’ southern base on Boris Johnson’s government.
The Lib Dems came third here in 2019, while the Conservative winning margin was a gargantuan 24,239. But having recently won a brace of safe Tory seats at by-elections in Chesham and Amersham and North Shropshire, Lib Dem campaigners have poured into the seat.
However, the Conservatives are also battling hard to hold on to what was theirs, albeit with a lower-key, tightly controlled strategy that couldn’t be more different to the Lib Dems’ electoral shock and awe.
And despite talk of an informal alliance between opposition parties, Labour’s candidate, who came second here in 2019, insists she hasn’t given up the fight, either.
On Honiton’s handsome Georgian High Street, Jubilee bunting flutters against the florists and tea rooms. It’s here that the Lib Dems have set up one of their campaign headquarters in an empty shop unit.
Inside, a crudely sketched map on the wall shows where party volunteers have travelled from – Orkney, Carlisle, Kingston-upon-Hull. The party say that last weekend, 350 activists knocked on 14,000 doors.
Piles of leaflets are carefully arranged into neat bundles by polling district. Canvassers are given issues specific to each area to discuss – river pollution in Axminster, for instance, or lack of dental services here in Honiton.
In charge of directing volunteers today is Chessie Flack, 24. What gives her a political identity, she says, is “this perfect Lib Dem machine of a load of activists in socks and sandals, and they knock on every door in the constituency and they win the campaign”.
But no-one is under any illusions that overturning such a huge majority will be easy.
Chessie Flack
In a cafe across the street, the party’s candidate Richard Foord empties a pile of miniature marshmallows into his hot chocolate and stirs. Bookmakers have named him the favourite to win but he knows he’ll need all the energy he can summon.
“I think we can’t entirely take at face value the bookies’ odds as a predictor or a forecast of this election outcome,” Foord says.
“We are absolutely working for every single vote but recognising that there’s a mountain to climb, frankly.”
Richard Foord
In his Tattersall shirt, Foord, who lives locally, looks like he’s stepped out of the pages of Country Life magazine. He has the military bearing, too, of a man who spent a decade in the Army, having risen to the rank of major. On the front page of a leaflet distributed by his campaign, he is pictured in uniform above the slogan: “I served my country. Now I’m fighting for Devon.”
Along with the Union Jack bunting in the window of the campaign office, this looks a lot like a pitch to the 58% of voters in the seat who voted to leave the EU.
Earlier in the day I spotted Sir Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, on a train heading west, and asked if his party’s “Stop Brexit” slogan under former leader Jo Swinson in 2019 damaged its chances here in 2022. He was emphatic that it didn’t: “Traditionally we’ve been strong in rural communities, Liberal Democrats have been strong in the West Country,” said Sir Ed. “So in many ways this is going back to where our roots are.”
Helen Hurford
In a 1980s estate on the fringe of Tiverton, the sun blazes down on a near-empty car park outside a community centre. Half an hour ago, the phone in my pocket buzzed and a Tory press officer summoned me here to meet candidate Helen Hurford.
Previously, the Independent reported that she had been “ordered not to speak to the media”. The Financial Times wrote that she “was being shielded from the national media” and the Times described her as “somewhat elusive”.
But now a car pulls up and out steps Hurford, in a blue dress and trainers. With a broad smile, she flatly rejects the suggestion that she’d been kept hidden from the press corps.
“If you’d wanted to find me you could have just followed me around, knocking on the doors – you would have easily found me,” she says.
Her focus, she suggests, is on the residents of Tiverton and Honiton, not reporters: “The people of the constituency come first.”
She talks about the need to improve the area’s road and rail network and support local farmers. Hurford emphasises, too, that she was born and brought up in Honiton and was the head teacher at a local school. “She has probably taught a large part of the population around here,” says local Conservative activist Luis Gordon.
It’s not the only way in which the Conservative campaign appears to have been carefully managed. While Johnson has visited the constituency during the campaign, his appearances have been low-key and without advance fanfare.
The Lib Dems have accused the prime minister of “hiding away” – but equally, it makes sense for the Tories not to take risks. “It’s a small-C and big-C Conservative area,” says Dr Hannah Bunting, a political scientist at the University of Exeter. “It would really be remarkable if we saw the seat changing hands, even under the current conditions.”
Privately, senior Lib Dem insiders concede that the Conservatives are taking this contest a lot more seriously than they did prior to their December 2021 defeat in North Shropshire.
And while national issues might be a headache for the Tory campaign, it’s not clear that the circumstances of Neil Parish’s departure are having much of an impact. The former MP, a farmer himself, enjoyed a lot of goodwill among the agricultural community, according to Richard Tucker, chair of the local National Farmers Union.
Richard Tucker
“As farmers we felt we were well represented in this area,” adds Tucker. At a recent NFU hustings, he says, “all the candidates were pretty open in acknowledging that they weren’t as agriculturally qualified as Neil. But they’re all open to learning – well, they’ve got to be.”
Issues they’ll need to have brushed up on include the government’s new food strategy, the phasing out of taxpayer-funded direct payments to farmers under an EU scheme and the surging cost of fertiliser – all of huge concern to those working in agriculture locally.
Among those contesting the by-election are the United Kingdom Independence Party, which came second in the seat in 2015, and Reform UK, which shares some of its political DNA, having also once been led by Nigel Farage.
The Green Party, which attracted more than 2,000 votes here in 2019, is also standing again.
Above all, what seems to motivate Conservative activists is the suggestion that Labour – who are concentrating their fire on Wakefield – have agreed to give the Lib Dems a free run in Tiverton and Honiton. Both opposition parties strenuously deny there has been any kind of formal agreement.
But Chris Daw, a local councillor who has been campaigning for Hurford, is visibly riled at the notion of any stitch-up. “It annoys me because I think, you know, let’s just be honest with each other,” she says. “Not just put out hints. I believe they should be straight up front and say what they’re doing.”
If anyone could confirm or deny the existence of a pact, it’s Liz Pole. This is the second time she has stood as Labour’s candidate in Tiverton and Honiton. On the previous occasion, in 2019, she earned more than 11,000 votes while finishing second, albeit distantly.
Over tea in a cafe in Cullompton, in the west of the constituency, Pole is emphatic that there has been no deal. “That is definitely not part of my political DNA whatsoever,” she says. “I’m fighting to win this constituency, I want to see Labour thriving and growing.”
Liz Pole
However, Pole, who runs a software business and has lived locally for 20 years, admits it’s “frustrating” to read articles anointing the Lib Dems as the main challengers. Remarks by nearby Exeter MP Ben Bradshaw were interpreted as calling for a Lib Dem win, although Pole says his comments were “taken a little bit out of context”.
While Labour’s big beasts, including party leader Keir Starmer and deputy Angela Rayner, have flocked to Wakefield, it’s harder to detect them in this part of Devon. Asked about this, Pole replies that she’s expecting a visit from shadow food, farming and fisheries minister Daniel Zeichner – a frontbencher, certainly, but perhaps not one with the greatest box-office appeal.
So Pole is getting help from closer to home. She says Labour has activists in each of the seat’s 24 wards and their campaign will go into each of them with her messages about affordable housing, the cost of living crisis and food strategy.
Richard Clarke, 49, has travelled here from Cawsand, south-east Cornwall, to campaign for Pole. He says that on the doorstep, voters are receptive to what she’s saying.
“People know we need a change of government – and people also know that needs to be a Labour government, because obviously you don’t get Liberal governments, unless you’re living in 1906,” he says.
There’s a sense among Labour’s activists, however, that the by-election has come at an inopportune time for the party.
Broader trends suggest traditional north-south political divides are being upended and in 2021’s local elections Labour won district council seat in Honiton, its first in East Devon for more than two decades. Parish’s resignation, some volunteers feel, interrupted that momentum.
“Voters are looking for a home, I think, and a by-election isn’t necessarily the best time to find that,” says retired academic Paul Furlong, 73, from Aveton Gifford in south Devon.
Nonetheless, Tiverton and Honiton has until Thursday to find a berth, temporary or otherwise.
Boris Johnson’s former ethics adviser has said the reason given by Downing Street for his resignation was a “distraction” and doubled down on claims that the government wanted to break international law.
After he dramatically quit this week, Christopher Geidt said his explanation had used too much “cautious language” leading to “some confusion about the precise cause of my decision”.
In Lord Geidt’s initial letter to No 10 on Wednesday, he said he had been asked to give advice on an “odious” breach of the ministerial code. The response from Johnson suggested this was over a plan to extend steel tariffs in contravention of World Trade Organization rules.
However, after much mystery over why Geidt decided to quit over this issue and not greater concerns around Partygate, he issued a “clarification about the reasons for my departure”. “There has been some confusion about the precise cause of my decision,” he wrote in a letter to the Tory MP William Wragg, the chair of the public administration and constitutional affairs committee (PACAC).
“My letter has been interpreted to suggest that an important issue of principle was limited to some narrow and technical consideration of steel tariffs. The cautious language of my letter may have failed adequately to explain the far wider scope of my objection.”
Geidt, a former private secretary to the Queen, said the emphasis on the steel tariffs issue was a distraction and “simply one example of what might yet constitute deliberate breaches by the United Kingdom of its obligations under international law, given the government’s widely publicised openness to this”.
While the explicit reference to international law was removed from the ministerial code in 2015, Geidt said there was “no explicit derogation, no let-off written into the code to absolve individual ministers of their own obligations”. He said given his commitment to integrity, “I could not be a party to advising on any potential law-breaking”.
Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy leader, said Geidt had quit “because of the odious behaviour of Boris Johnson’s Downing Street”, and added: “It’s high time for Tory MPs to do the decent thing by showing this rotten, rule-breaking prime minister the door.”
Sign up to First Edition, our free daily newsletter – every weekday morning at 7am BST
Karin Smyth, a Labour MP who sits on PACAC, said the Geidt letter had provided “helpful clarity”, but that “it isn’t steel that broke the camel’s back”.
The government was accused earlier in the week of threatening to breach international law by publishing plans to unilaterally override the Northern Ireland protocol signed by Johnson as part of his Brexit deal.
Westminster insiders speculated that Geidt could have been referring to the issue without explicitly referencing it in his latest letter when he referred to concerns about ministers breaking international law.
Geidt is the second ethics adviser to quit under Johnson. In November 2020 Alex Allen stepped down after his finding that the home secretary, Priti Patel, had breached the ministerial code by bullying staff was brushed aside by No 10.
Downing Street has launched a review of the ethics adviser role and has not confirmed whether it will replace Geidt.
The Conservative candidate in the Tiverton & Honiton by-election was jeered and heckled by an angry crowd last night [Thursday] as she tried to dodge questions on Boris Johnson’s integrity.
Helen Hurford, the owner of a beauty salon, was met with hostility at the only hustings held before the ballot next Thursday.
The by-election was triggered by the resignation of Neil Parish, the Tory MP who was forced to stand down after he admitted to watching porn in the House of Commons.
The Liberal Democrats are hoping to overturn a huge Tory majority of 24,239 and deliver another blow to Johnson after the prime minister narrowly survived a vote of no confidence last week.
The party secured by-election upsets last year in the traditionally Conservative safe seats of Chesham & Amersham and North Shropshire.
At the hustings, which took place in Tiverton High School, Hurford was asked what she made of the resignation of Lord Geidt, who stood down as the prime minister’s adviser on ministerial standards on Wednesday.
“In light of the resignations of two ethics advisers in less than two years, what is your personal view on the moral character of Boris Johnson?” a member of the audience asked.
Hurford said that Johnson was “honest in relation to the pledges he makes”, but did not give her own view on his moral character.
As she tried to list the government’s achievements in rolling out the coronavirus vaccine and providing military support to Ukraine, her response was increasingly drowned out by angry cries of “shame” and “answer the question”.
“It is very easy to stand on the sidelines and attack and be aggressive,” Hurford retorted. “What I am hearing on the doorsteps is people are fed up of it. They are sick to death of it. And what they want to hear is how we are going to support them with the cost of living which is affecting us all.”
Pressed about whether she had any concerns about Johnson’s character, Hurford said: “I have no concerns that his pledges are honest.” Her answer was greeted with boos and jeers.
Johnson visited Tiverton & Honiton last week, where he held a private meeting with Hurford and a group of farmers.
The Conservatives have stepped up their campaign with Michael Gove, the housing secretary, and Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, among those to go canvassing in east Devon.
I imagine that most readers are simply exasperated that Boris Johnson, despite being so comprehensively disgraced, has still not gone. He has lost the confidence of the public in Devon and across the country, but he continues to cling to power. Finally, his MPs managed to hold a vote of no confidence and many of them voted against him. But it seems that still the majority will back him come what may.
In their party best: Hurford and Johnson hiding from the public together for a photo-opportunity in a supporter’s garden.
The spinelessness of East Devon’s Conservatives
It is sadly no surprise to find that our local Conservative representatives appear to be among these. Simon Jupp, the MP for the East Devon constituency, had said he was waiting for the Sue Gray report to make up his mind. Well the Metropolitan Police issued Johnson with a fixed penalty, Gray issued a damning report, and still Mr Jupp had nothing to say. We must assume he’s one of the MPs who backed Johnson but was too ashamed of it to let his constituents know. Maybe Johnson promised to make him a junior minister for paper clips next time round?
What is it with the East Devon Conservatives? Having produced over the last decade one councillor, Graham Brown, who was caught offering to fix planning for large sums of money, an Alderman, John Humphreys, who was convicted of appalling rapes, and now an MP, Neil Parish, who had to resign for watching porn in the House of Commons, the rest of them just seem to be particularly spineless.
Certainly their by-election candidate in the Tiverton and Honiton constituency, Helen Hurford, is in no hurry to break the rule. Still silent on virtually all the issues of the day, Ms Hurford sat out the Johnson confidence vote and waited until the prime minister had won before making a comment, to the effect that she gave him her support. If voters are misguided enough to return her to Parliament on June 23rd, don’t expect her to be outspoken about East Devon’s interests – or anything else.
A captive of the party machine
We only have to look at Ms Hurford’s campaign literature to see that this very inexperienced politician – she only recently became a town councillor – has already become captive to her party machine. How else to explain that she put out a leaflet addressed to the voters of ‘Tiverton, Honiton and the surrounding villages’, seemingly unaware that Seaton, Axminster and Cullompton are substantial towns? The leaflet was clearly written by some advertising person from London, but why didn’t the candidate put them right?
More serious was the leaflet on yellow paper which contained a collection of smears and distortions about the Liberal Democrats. The leaflet had Ms Hurford’s name in tiny print at the bottom but no indication at all that it was produced by the Conservatives. This leaflet has now attracted national notoriety – why didn’t the candidate veto it?
Most concerning of all to me was that she used Seaton’s community hospital for a photo opportunity, claiming that there are hundreds of new nurses ‘in our area’. This is the hospital that lost its beds and was almost demolished for housing development because of her government’s policies and the refusal of Devon Conservative councillors to block the closures. Given the national shortage of beds, the hospital ward could be put back to use – but the shortage of nurses is so chronic that it probably couldn’t be staffed as things stand.
Support Richard Foord on the 23rd
This is my last column before the by-election, in which we have the chance to end decades of being taken for granted by complacent Conservative MPs. Richard Foord, the Liberal Democrat candidate, has been on the doorsteps in Seaton and Axminster and is running an honest – and vocal – campaign. I will not be going as far as my East Devon Alliance colleague, Paul Arnott, and actually joining the Liberal Democrats. I intend to remain independent of any national party. But I urge all my readers to support Mr Foord on the 23rd.
Vanlifers are are people who live in a car or van either part time or full time.
The Journal understands there have been caravans and motor homes parked in on the site behind the Marks and Spencer Foodhall, in Royal Avenue, for around three months.
The site is owned by East Devon District Council (EDDC), however, the authority has confirmed that the site was re-regulated as a car park to facilitate works to improve the town’s sea defences.
This has left the council powerless to stop motor homes and caravans parking there.
EDDC says it is looking at future regulation of the site.
An EDDC spokesman said: “We are aware of a number of vanlifers who have been using the area behind Marks and Spencer, in Royal Avenue, in Exmouth.
“The car park was de-regulated as part of the tidal defence work to allow it to be used as a construction compound and site office, and so far a new parking places order has not been applied, this means we cannot stop campers and motorhomes parking there at this time.
“The council is currently considering the future regulation of the site and it will be discussed next month, at a campervans and motorhomes car park workshop.”
Currently, water quality for sewage and swimming quality is reviewed once a week by the Environment Agency and South West Water.
At the full council meeting on Monday (June 13), members of the Exmouth Escape (End Sewage Convoys and Pollution in Exmouth) group provided evidence to councillors about the amount of sewage being pumped into the sea at Exmouth, and the Exe Estuary.
In response, councillors discussed inviting a representative of South West Water to a town council meeting to discuss what more can be done to limit the amount of pollution and sewage.
Councillors said they were ‘extremely concerned’ about the increasing amount of sewage being imported into Exmouth by lorry, the consequential damage to roads and the resulting carbon footprint.
Cllr Olly Davey said: “I notice in one of the answers from South West Water to Simon Jupp that when they were queried on whether there was insufficient evidence, their response was there is, but not in the summer when the tourists arrive, well, that suggests to me it’s insufficient for several months of the year.
“That’s not an answer, so if you can’t cope when the tourists come
“I agree South West Water have had pressure from EDDC (East Devon District Council), I don’t think they need pressure from us as well, they need pressure from absolutely everybody.
“They have been able to distribute eye-watering amounts of sewage and yet somehow they keep telling us they cant do this and that.
“I would like to make one amendment one bit of this, point three, I think we should write to the CEO and ask her to address a council meeting, not the council because you’re only giving yourself one bite of the cherry and also CEO or a representative because they may feel someone else may be more appropriate.”
Exmouth Town Council will now go back to South West Water and invite them to the next town council meeting to discuss.
“I will be giving my loyalty to somebody who has been given a third mandate by the party. This has happened. We need to move on.”
Questioned a second time if Johnson was fundamentally honest, she replied: “I think Boris thinks that he is an honest person. How I conduct myself is how I conduct myself, and I think you are trying to catch me out here.”
A vote for Helen Hurford is a vote for Boris – Owl
The Conservative candidate in Tiverton and Honiton has blamed the media for preventing the public from “moving on” from Partygate and twice declined to say that Boris Johnson was honest.
In an interview with the Guardian, Helen Hurford acknowledged the party faced a very tight battle to retain the previously ultra-safe seat and criticised what she called the media’s “persistent regurgitating of Partygate”. Asked if she believed Boris Johnson was fundamentally honest, Hurford twice refused to say.
Hurford, a former headteacher and a Honiton town councillor who now runs a beauty training business, is defending a 24,000-plus majority won in 2019 by the MP Neil Parish, who resigned in April after admitting he had watched pornography on his phone in the Commons chamber.
But the byelection on 23 June, which comes on the same day the Tories defend another seat in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, is widely seen as an ultra-close race between Hurford and the Liberal Democrat candidate, Richard Foord.
Internal polling by the Lib Dems of those intending to vote on the day of the byelection, released on Wednesday, put the Conservatives on 46% and the Lib Dems on 44%.
“I think it’s going to be very tight, and we can’t take anything for granted whatsoever,” Hurford said. “It could come down to very small numbers.”
Asked why a seat that has been Conservative-held in its various geographical variations for well over a century was now under threat, Hurford said issues raised by voters included the cost of living and “what happened with Neil Parish”.
She added: “And thirdly, the media’s persistent regurgitating of Partygate – even though there has been a line drawn in the sand, and there has been a report, it is constantly in the news, and people aren’t allowed to move on from it.”
“So, of course, that’s impacting. That is what I’m hearing on doorsteps as well – people are sick and tired of seeing it. They are sick and tired of hearing it. They want to talk about what’s important.”
Asked if this meant the media were in part to blame for the Tories’ struggles in the seat, Hurford said: “It’s not necessarily the media’s fault, but I think it’s time to stop. There needs to be a change of narrative about what is important.”
Hurford said she did understand voters’ worries about trust as a result of the Downing Street parties, adding: “All I can say is that the byelection is to pick a representative for Tiverton and Honiton, your next MP. As a former headteacher I am very trustworthy. When I say I’m going to do something, I do it. This is what is important – the person who is going to be representing you in Westminster.”
Asked if Johnson was equally trustworthy, she declined to answer directly, saying: “I will be giving my loyalty to somebody who has been given a third mandate by the party. This has happened. We need to move on.”
Questioned a second time if Johnson was fundamentally honest, she replied: “I think Boris thinks that he is an honest person. How I conduct myself is how I conduct myself, and I think you are trying to catch me out here.”
Asked, finally, if she was comfortable going into a parliamentary party led by Johnson, she replied: “I’m comfortable representing Tiverton and Honiton as their MP with the Conservatives, with a prime minister who has once again, for the third time, been shown support by the majority of the party. That is what I will be going for. Everything else has happened. I’m looking forwards to the future.
“I don’t want to play party politics. I don’t want to be drawn into things that have happened. I want to be talking about what I can deliver for Tiverton and Honiton.”
The 44-year-old is bidding to end Conservative domination of the seat since it was created in 1997 but faces having to overturn a majority of more than 24,000 secured by disgraced former MP Neil Parish in 2019.
Both parties are campaigning hard in Devon, where defeat for the government on 23 June would be seen as a big blow to Boris Johnson’s leadership. No other party has represented this area at Westminster – both before and after boundary changes – since 1924.
Mr Foord, a former army major who now works for Oxford University from his home in Mid Devon, says such a single party domination can “breed apathy.”
“Honestly the feedback I’m getting is [that this is] a by-election and is about choosing our MP rather than necessarily choosing the government, we can do differently this time,” he said.
“That’s the message that I’m getting back, and I would just reinforce the point that, yes, we’ve been neglected and taken for granted for so long that it is indeed time for change.”
The Lib Dems point to high ambulance waiting times, problems with funding a new town centre relief road in Cullompton and the lack of a new high school in Tiverton as just a few examples.
The Conservatives reject claims about underfunding, which have also been made by Labour candidate Liz Pole. It says their government is “delivering for people in Tiverton and Honiton and across the whole south west.”
In addition to cash towards transport improvements, the party claims £77 million has been spent supporting people in Devon during covid, protecting 17,000 jobs in Tiverton and Honiton through the furlough scheme and by providing loans to local businesses.
Tory candidate Helen Hurford, who has also backed the new relief road and upgraded high school, last week said she was only one who could work directly with the government and was “focused solely on delivering” for the area.
But Mr Foord, speaking in Honiton, suggests it’s time for a shake-up: “I don’t think that we have seen very much interest paid by the government in our area while we’ve consistently returned Conservative politicians to parliament.
“And this this kind of complacency is apparent when you knock on doors around here. People say to you, ‘well, it’s fantastic that you’ve called because we haven’t had a Conservative politician knock on our door for decades.’”
He is aiming to become the first Lib Dem MP in Devon since Sarah Wollaston, who defected from the Tories in 2019 to the short-lived Change UK and subsequently the Lib Dems.
Mr Foord’s campaign is focussing on action to tackle the cost of living, including a VAT cut from 20 to 17.5 per cent, cutting waiting times for GPs and ambulances and getting a ‘fairer deal’ for Devon farmers.
Eight candidates – including from each of the main parties – are vying for the Tiverton and Honiton seat:
Lord Geidt’s resignation letter and the Prime Minister’s reply were published yesterday. Does this provide the clarity we all hoped for? – Owl
Here is an extract from Paul Waugh’s view from inews:
……Some Tory MPs may view Geidt as the mouse that finally roared. But others will see his letter as a squeak, and allow the PM to carry on regardless.
Timing in politics is also everything. If Geidt had quit in the wake of the full Sue Gray report, it would have had much more impact on Tory MPs and their confidence vote.
He ends up seeming more furious about trade tariffs than about Partygate itself. Why didn’t he say Covid rule-breaking had put him in “an odious position”? Why hadn’t the PM’s misleading Parliament “made a mockery” of the principles of public life?
Appearing to expend more anger about obscure trade rules (for which the Government will get popular support) than lockdown law-breaking only confirmed the image of a man who has spent so long in the thicket of the Establishment that he can’t see the wood for the trees. After his humiliation by MPs, Geidt may have been looking for any excuse to quit, but this excuse just wasn’t that great.
In the end, his resignation seemed to be more about protecting his own damaged reputation than doing anything to seriously question that of the PM’s. That’s why Johnson may well escape the opprobrium once more.
And the final insult was yet to come. No.10 hinted the independent ministerial adviser may not even be replaced and the role handed to a civil servant. Perhaps the most damning indictment of Geidt’s record would be if no one notices he’s actually gone.
He wants to end the shameful postcode lottery which leaves millions of Brits unable to get an appointment not on Zoom.
Vast parts of the country have a massive shortage of full-time GPs – fuelling the problem.
The Health Secretary is considering a range of reforms to try to end the scandal.
One option is to change GP contracts so they are “incentivised” to go from working part time to full time.
While they could also be offered lucrative bungs to move to left-behind areas.
And a big focus will also be put on getting GPs to offer more face to face appointments.
A Government source said the aim is to give patients “more choice” so elderly patients are not forced to go online when they really want to physically see a doctor.
But the number of face to face appointments “is expected to increase”.
Whitehall insiders insisted that changing GP contracts is just one of the options being looked at.
With No10 already bracing for a “summer of discontent” from militant rail unions, they do not want to have a row with doctors unions too.
So they are expected to try to lure GPs into increasing their hours and being more flexible rather than ordering them to.
Yet another report has revealed that patients are suffering because of delays in ambulances being able to discharge them into hospital beds. This means long delays when awaiting an ambulance: the very sick and injured, in category two, now have to wait for an average of more than 40 minutes. The target is 18 minutes. Quite simply, there are too few available beds and one reason for this is that at least 10 per cent of patients are “bed blocking”. They do not have access to “care packages” so cannot leave hospital. In many instances, the percentage is higher and in Gloucestershire it is 29 per cent. With many others in East Devon, I campaigned vigorously to defeat the government’s plan to remove dozens of beds in local and modern community hospitals. We failed: the consequences are painfully evident. Doubtless, this grim situation will be blamed on Covid but England has cut the total number of NHS beds from nearly 300,000 in 1987 to 141,000 in 2019, despite an increase in population from 47.3 million to 56.6 million with the elderly accounting for a higher share. The UK has fewer beds per thousand of population than most comparable countries in Western Europe. Many of us, even before Covid, warned that this grim situation could occur because of the government’s policy but we were ignored and damaging closures, especially in East Devon, were implemented.
What use does Boris Johnson have for an ethics adviser anyway? – Owl
His demeanour and delivery screamed exasperation, even if his words were carefully chosen. When Lord Geidt appeared before a parliamentary committee on Tuesday, for the best part of two hours, he didn’t look like a man in love with his job.
By Chris Mason Political editor, BBC News www.bbc.co.uk
Just over 24 hours later, in a written statement of few words and even less detail, came confirmation that he really didn’t.
He was resigning, the second such ethics adviser to the prime minister to walk in the last eighteen months. It appears he had concluded his position was untenable, enough was enough.
It also appears there are more details he is privy to about what has been going on than are currently known about more widely.
So what do we know about what happened in the last few days?
I’m told that on Monday, Lord Geidt met the prime minister and offered to serve in the job for another six months.
He was also asked by Boris Johnson to advise on a commercial decision the government is contemplating – and whether this would breach any existing commitments and so not be in line with the ministerial code.
We don’t know the details of this yet, nor if this request contributed to his resignation, but the specific timing of his departure has left No10 baffled, given his commitment to stay.
On Wednesday evening, Lord Geidt phoned the prime minister’s principal private secretary to tell him he was resigning. Mr Johnson was informed of the decision at about 18:30 BST, shortly after finishing a phone call with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky.
But while the particular timing has surprised some in Downing Street, Lord Geidt’s discomfort in the job has been evident for a while.
Just last month he had said in a report that it was a legitimate question to ask if Boris Johnson had breached the ministerial code by breaking Covid laws.
But, as Lord Geidt put it, the code’s “author and guardian” is Mr Johnson. The prime minister hadn’t sought an investigation from Lord Geidt into whether he had, and was of the view that he hadn’t.
As Lord Geidt put it: “I have attempted to avoid the independent adviser offering advice to a prime minister about a prime minister’s obligations under his own ministerial code.
“If a prime minister’s judgement is that there is nothing to investigate or no case to answer, he would be bound to reject any such advice, thus forcing the resignation of the independent adviser. Such a circular process could only risk placing the ministerial code in a place of ridicule.”
The truth is we don’t yet know definitively why Lord Geidt resigned, as his resignation letter has not been published – which itself is unconventional.
The prime minister is expected to write back to Lord Geidt on Thursday morning, and that reply may well be made public.
So twice in a year-and-a-half, the person appointed to oversee ethics and conduct in Mr Johnson’s government has given up.
Just as Mr Johnson had managed to shift the political conversation away from his behaviour and on to policy, a swirl of headlines about this appears.
And along with the headlines, comes a vacancy in government. I walked down Whitehall earlier on; I can’t say I spotted a queue of people lining up to take the job on.
The people of Whitby have voted overwhelmingly to limit the sale of second homes in the Yorkshire seaside town, making it the latest tourist hotspot to turn the tide on holidaymakers pricing out local people.
A parish poll held on Monday night asked locals if they wanted new [homes] to be reserved for locals, to which 93 per cent voted in favour.
Of the 2,228 ballots cast, 157 voted against and 18 ballots were rejected.
One in five properties in the town where Bram Stoker’s Dracula is set, are second homes or holiday lets, according to Scarborough borough council.
That proportion has more than doubled in the past two decades.
People say that the rise in second-home ownership has meant that locals cannot afford to buy in their home town.
Last year house prices rose by 17 per cent and the average asking price is £254,218, according to Rightmove.
This is the second highest price increase of any coastal town, beaten only by Padstow in Cornwall where they jumped 20 per cent.
Anthony George, 25, said that the vote was an expression of “pent-up frustration” against a situation that had led to many young people having to leave Whitby.
“If you want to buy a house these days in Whitby, on a Whitby salary, good luck to you,” said George, an apprentice chef. The average salary in the town is £18,900.
“As it stands, I’m going to have to rent for the rest of my life if I want to stay, or move 20 miles inland.”
Whitby attracts more than 150,000 visitors each year, many of whom come to visit the ruins of the Benedictine abbey above the town.
The poll is the latest sign of unrest in tourist hotspots as local families struggle to match the prices paid by those wanting second homes by the sea.
Residents of St Ives, Fowey and Mevagissey – all in Cornwall – have previously voted to limit sales of new builds to permanent residents.
Last week Tim Farron, MP for South Lakes, urged the government to consider giving local authorities the power to limit second home ownership.
During a debate in parliament on the Levelling Up Bill, Farron said that excessive second home ownership had led to the prospect of buying or even renting a house becoming a “pipe dream” for people in rural areas such as his constituency in Cumbria.
The Whitby poll, which had a turnout of 24 per cent, is not legally binding but organisers hope it will influence planning decisions.
Linda Wild, the mayor of Whitby, called on the borough council and the government to amend planning regulations to make it possible to protect local housing for primary residence.
“We need a ‘use class’ which applies to holiday lets,” she said. “Then the planners can manage that change of use. We also need to tax second homes and holiday homes more effectively through council tax and business rates to reflect the impact they have on local people.
“Whitby is not unique in this predicament and local people want their voice heard by government alongside people from Cornwall, North Norfolk, Northumberland and the Lakes. We absolutely need government to give local people the power to keep holiday resort communities sustainable.”
A spokesman for Scarborough borough council said: “The outcome of the poll is no more and no less than an expression of the views of the electorate of the parish who have voted in the poll and is not binding on any organisation.”
The Liberal Democrats plan to flood Tiverton and Honiton with activists after internal polling suggested the party was only marginally trailing the Conservatives before next week’s byelection in the Devon constituency.
A sample carried out by the party, based on tens of thousands of voter contacts, suggested that of people intending to vote on the day of the byelection, the Conservatives had 46% support and the Lib Dems 44%.
The party said it had a four-point deficit at the same point before December’s byelection in North Shropshire, which it won.
Victory for the Lib Dems in Tiverton and Honiton requires overturning a Conservative majority of 24,239, which the party says would be the biggest such margin ever overcome in a byelection, although other races have seen bigger swings in percentage terms.
If the polling figures are accurate they suggest that an unspoken accord between the Lib Dems and Labour to focus resources on one each of the two byelections taking place next Thursday could result in a double defeat for Boris Johnson.
Labour has concentrated efforts in Wakefield, where it appears to be well ahead. The Lib Dem figures suggest support for Labour in Tiverton and Honiton, where it has tried less hard, has shrunk to 6%.
Labour finished ahead of the Lib Dems in Tiverton and Honiton in 2019, and activists vigorously dispute the idea they are badly lagging there this time, saying recent council seat gains indicate they will again outperform the Lib Dems.
While the Lib Dems have triumphed in two previously strongly Tory seats in the last year, starting with a byelection win in Chesham and Amersham, party officials put their chances in the Devon seat at no better than 50-50.
The Conservatives have campaigned hard in Tiverton and Honiton, with Johnson among a series of senior figures to visit. Lib Dem canvassers report worries that some former Tory voters, while disaffected over issues such as Downing Street parties and complaints that the government has neglected the area, could simply stay at home rather than transfer their support.
The Lib Dems have issued a call for MPs, peers and activists to head to the constituency immediately to help with canvassing, with officials saying travel plans need to be made because of next week’s national rail strikes.
A party source said: “The momentum is definitely with the Liberal Democrats in Tiverton and Honiton, but it is not by any means over the line. If we get an army of activists knocking on doors this weekend, we can do it. Whatever happens it’s going to be a very close-run thing.”
The byelection was prompted by the resignation of Neil Parish, the Tory MP since 2010, after he admitted watching pornography on his phone in the Commons.
Professor Jim Hall, Professor of Climate and Environmental Risks and former Director of the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford, said: “We need to have honest conversations with coastal communities that it will simply not be possible to protect every house and business from sea level rise.
Nearly 200,000 homes are at risk of being abandoned by the 2050s – and East Devon is on the list of affected areas, according to new research.
The district – which includes Sidmouth, Exmouth, Lyme Regis and Seaton – features in the top 20 places which would be hardest hit should water levels rise by around 35cm in the next 28 years, as forecasts warn.
According to new research published in the peer-reviewed journal Oceans and Coastal Management, sea level rises caused by climate change are putting nearly 200,000 English properties at risk of being abandoned by the 2050s.
The study was led by Paul Sayers, an expert on flood and coastal risks who works with the Tyndall Centre at University of East Anglia and advises the Climate Change Committee (CCC).
It concluded mean sea levels around England will be around 35cm higher by 2050 than their historical level and will continue to rise as increasing global temperatures, due to greenhouse gas emissions, melts glaciers and ice caps and causes ocean waters to expand as they warm.
In addition, foreshores are at risk of being eroded, which can further deepen the water at the coast leading to larger waves reaching the shore.
The combination of sea-level rise and larger waves will greatly increase the number of properties at risk of flooding.
Investment in improved sea walls and other defences will protect many of the properties at risk, but this will not be affordable or possible everywhere.
For the first time, the new study calculates how many English properties will be threatened with coastal flooding but where the costs of improving defences may be too high or technically impossible for the government to continue to protect communities, given current funding regimes.
The researchers found that, by the 2050s, 120,000-160,000 properties along the English coast are at risk of relocation due to sea level rise, in addition to 30-35,000 properties that had already been identified as at risk from sea level rise.
This means the number of properties at risk is five times higher than suggested within current shoreline planning documents, and many communities that face an uncertain future haven’t yet been identified.
In 2018, the CCC identified 100,000 properties that would be at risk from sliding into the sea due to coastal erosion – meaning around 300,000 properties are at risk from sea level rise and coastal erosion.
This analysis found that around 30% of local authority assessments, known as Shoreline Management Plans, which recommend ‘Hold-the-Line’ in the longer term – implying that sea defences will be built and maintained along the shoreline – may be unrealistic as sea levels rise due to cost or feasibility constraints, covering 1,700km of the English coast.
When will homes start to be lost?
In March 2020, 41% of mortgages had terms longer than 25 years and the median first-time buyer mortgage now lasts for 30 years.
Many people may be buying houses or paying off mortgages on properties which will not be habitable or will be within a few years of being abandoned by the end of the mortgage term.
Most people who are likely to be in this situation will be unaware of it and there is currently no government scheme to help them.
Which local authorities have the most properties at risk?
A total of 20 local authorities have 2,000 or more (some with tens of thousands) at risk of being lost to sea level rise including (ranked in order from most numbers of properties to fewest):
1. North Somerset
2. Sedgemoor
3. Eastbourne
4. Wyre
5. North East Lincolnshire
6. Warrington
7. Swale
8. Dover
9. Portsmouth
10. Tendring
11. Ipswich
12. Gloucester
13. Bristol City
14. Maldon
15. Adur
16. Cornwall
17. East Devon
18. East Lindsey
19. East Suffolk
20. West Lancashire
Decisions on precisely which, and how many, of these properties and communities will have to move will depend on government policy, the research concluded.
Since sea level rise responds relatively slowly to changes in global temperatures these risks in the 2050s are now almost inevitable, even if emissions are now cut rapidly, it said.
But faster emission cuts will greatly reduce the amount of sea level rise later this century and beyond.
Lead author Mr Sayers said: “Significant sea level rise is now inevitable. For many of our larger cities at the coast protection will continue to be provided, but for some coastal communities this may not be possible.
“We need a serious national debate about the scale of the threat to these communities and what represents a fair and sustainable response, including how to help people to relocate.”
How can we transition to stop this?
The study argues that England faces “a transformational challenge” but that there is a “lack of clarity as to how this transition will be made, particularly when it would impact communities”.
A new round of updates to local authority plans, which is happening now, is an opportunity to promote a more open discourse including where it is necessary to discuss relocation, according to the study.
It warns that postponing hard choices has consequences including “further (inappropriate) development [on flood plains]” or unfairly propagating “the belief that protection will continue in the long term”.
The study assessed a number of factors to determine the likely pressure for relocation including the type of settlement and landscape, the existing local authority plan, the economic case for continuing to protect properties, and shoreline vulnerability.
Large towns and cities are assumed to warrant Hold-the-Line protection while small communities are more vulnerable.
The economic case was assessed on a cost-benefit analysis using a lower cost-benefit ratio than is usually used to calculate whether projects should attract central government support, meaning the study potentially underestimates the number of properties at risk.
The combination of sea level rise and seabed erosion means that it will not be technically feasible to defend some areas, regardless of the question of cost, the report adds.
The types of areas most at risk from sea level rise
They include:
Single communities: For example, Fairbourne in Wales, which is already due to be abandoned to sea level rise.
These communities contain a large number of properties (Fairbourne has a population of 700 people) but the complexity of the shoreline and floodplain means that the cost of maintaining defences is so large that it can’t be justified.
Communities containing dispersed clusters of properties on a long floodplain: For example, the Somerset Levels, East coast and North West.
A narrow floodplain, with properties on, constrained between the shoreline and raising ground, e.g. Dawlish (Dawlish is being protected but other places like this may not be so lucky) – often roads and railways run along these areas
Small quay and coastal harbours communities: For example, quays across Cornwall – low lying properties squeezed between a rising ground and harbour quay walls
Professor Jim Hall, Professor of Climate and Environmental Risks and former Director of the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford, said: “We need to have honest conversations with coastal communities that it will simply not be possible to protect every house and business from sea level rise.
“These changes are coming sooner than we might think and we need to plan now for how we can adjust, including a nationwide strategic approach to deciding how to manage the coast sustainably in the future.”
The Conservative Party candidate in the Tiverton and Honiton by-election has been accused of “trying to erase” Boris Johnson from her campaign because he is seen as “toxic” to her hopes of retaining the traditionally safe Tory seat.
Tory candidate in Tiverton by-election accused of ‘trying to erase’ meeting with Boris Johnson
Mr Johnson visited the constituency last Friday to support his candidate Helen Hurford just hours after Chancellor Rishi Sunak had been in Devon to back her.
However, while the former headteacher turned beauty salon owner published a video of herself with Mr Sunak, she has not publicised the visit of the Prime Minister on any of her campaign social media sites or flyers.
She said: “If I was an MP at that time, I would have voted in favour of Boris because we need a leader that makes the big calls. He’s made the right decisions on those big calls.”
Last Saturday, Ms Hurford added that she considered Mr Johnson as “an asset” to her campaign, and that she would post a picture with him on her campaign sites in the coming days.
She said: “Yeah, it will go on. Perhaps Rishi may have felt that he would have been overshadowed.”
However, four days on since Ms Hurford told i that she would promote the Prime Minister’s support for her, she has failed to do so.
Instead, Ms Hurford has posted pictures of a visit by Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove on Saturday, and one from employment minister Mims Davies on Monday.
As well as Mr Sunak, she has also posted pictures and videos of herself with the Tory party’s co-chairman Oliver Dowden, Deputy Prime Minister Dominic Raab, and tourism minister Nigel Huddleston.
She is yet to promote last week’s visit of the Prime Minister in her campaign literature.
The official Twitter account for Tiverton and Honiton Conservative Party features pictures of Mr Gove, Mr Dowden and Mr Raab, but has avoided making any reference to the Prime Minister’s visit to the constituency so far. Ms Hurford does not have a Twitter account.
Ms Hurford’s main opponent claimed her campaign was avoiding any mention of Mr Johnson as he was a “vote loser on the doorsteps”.
Liberal Democrat candidate Richard Foord said: “There’s clearly been some hand-wringing in the local Conservative campaign about how to deploy Boris Johnson. Their conclusion was not at all, but they had no choice to but to accept the invitation that the Prime Minister made to himself to visit her in the constituency.
“I think he rather forced himself upon them. This is how I would read it. They’re trying to erase him from their campaign.”
Mark Field, a lifelong Conservative voter in Axminster, said he would not be voting for the Tories again until Mr Johnson was replaced as leader of the party.
“I didn’t even know he’d been in the constituency,” he said. “They snuck him in and out under our noses, didn’t they. And no wonder, he’d only get booed if he walked through Axminster. Even by many of us who voted for us last time. No wonder she’s hiding the fact that she met him. He’s toxic to her campaign.”
Ahead of Mr Johnson photo opportunity with Ms Hurford, he received a mixture of cheers and boos during a surprise visit to the Royal Cornwall Show.
Ms Hurford has been approached for comment.
The by-election was triggered by the resignation of Tory MP Neil Parish after he admitted watching porn in the House of Commons on his mobile phone.
East Devon Watch 