Days 479 to 485

I am not really speaking to this blog as I wrote a lengthy blog last night which it lost somewhere in the ether.

On Friday Ev and I went to a meeting of the Patients' Support Group. We were all asked to introduce ourselves. I said I was getting better. Ev quite correctly pointed out that I am better. Since my last report I have had no further acid attacks(goodbye Peanuts) and I continue to be able to lie on my left as well as my right. My weight this week has remained unchanged at 13 stone 12.

My guest on Angel Radio last Thursday was Paul Armfield. Paul's day job is Manager of Waterstones Book Shop in Newport. He is also a bass player in assorted bands, a singer, song writer and very grounded family man. I played some tracks from his CDs, which are available in HMV on the Island. He was a pleasure to interview in that he didn't dodge any questions. It never ceases to amaze me how many people there are on the Island doing very positive things. My guest on Thursday will be David Ouston from the Island Street Pastors.

Speaking of the Island the big issue is Parliamentary Representation. Historically the Island has always had its own MP. As more and more people move here to escape from the Mainland so numbers on the electoral roll have increased. In the General Election this year there were 109,000 voters here compared with a national average of around 64,000.

As part of a Coalition Government drive to cut the costs of Politics there are proposals to even out the size of constituencies to an average of 70,000 electors. Now dear reader you must be reasonably good at Maths. Here on the Isle of Wight we have too many voters to fit into one new Parliamentary Seat but not enough for two. The proposal therefore is to put 34,000 people who live on the Island into a constituency on the Mainland.

Unfortunately the Government has made exceptions in its plans for the Outer Hebrides and Orkney and Shetland because of their remoteness. This has raised the hackles of the Island's MP plus his Lib Dem and Labour defeated opponents. The demand quite simply is to leave the Island out of it on the grounds that what folk who live here want may be at odds with them there Mainland folk. There was delivered to Downing Street a 16,000 petition last week. I have to say opinion here is not unanimous. Many feel that we are under represented in Parliament(some seats in England have less than 60,000 voters). They also point out that given that almost half the electorate in the proposed new seat will live on the Island any MP who ignored their opinions would do so at their peril.

This story will run and run.

Hopefully this entry will be published. More next weekend.