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30 Most Recent News Stories
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Wed 18th Aug 2010
The Lib Dem group at County Hall has pressed the Conservative administration to be more open and transparent by publishing more information and by making decisions more openly.
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Read ""Through a glass darkly"" in full
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Mon 16th Aug 2010
The Agriculture Committee of the European Parliament has approved plans to reduce the number of animals used in scientific experiments. These plans are expected to be endorsed by the European Parliament and the European Council in September.
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Read "EU proposals to reduce animal testing" in full
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Wed 11th Aug 2010
In July 2009 the County Council's Interim Chief Executive Mr Michael Frater published a highly critical report about the County Council. At that time the Conservative administration said that Mr Frater would be invited to review the Council's progress one year following the publication of his report.
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Read "Progress report refused" in full
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Mon 9th Aug 2010
MEPs have taken an axe to the illegal logging trade by banning the sale of illegal timber in Europe and setting up strict penalties for those caught doing so. Illegal logging is estimated to represent 20-40% of global industrial wood production, and contributes heavily to carbon emissions and the destruction of biodiversity.
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Read "MEPs axe illegal timber trade" in full
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Mon 2nd Aug 2010
The Conservative administration at County Hall has stated its ambition for the Council to be World Class but has not provided any definition of this term. However, it is clear that Surrey residents believe that the County Council has room for considerable improvement.
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Read "Surrey 'World Class'? - Residents still don't think so!" in full
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Wed 28th Jul 2010
The EU's bank watchdog, the Committee of European Banking Supervisors (CEBS), is to publish the results of its bank stress tests. Stress tests were implemented last year in the US to identify banks that would require additional capital to survive in case the recession got worse.
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Read "Bank stress tests cannot be a half-way house" in full
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Tue 27th Jul 2010
The Coalition Government has announced a Pupil Premium to target extra money at schools taking disadvantaged pupils. The proposed Pupil Premium would provide additional per pupil funding on top of the existing funding provided to schools. Schools will be free to spend the additional funding as they choose to raise the achievement of disadvantage pupils. This was a key manifesto commitment and one that Nick Clegg made clear was one of his absolute priorities.
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Read "Surrey Liberal Democrats Welcome the Pupil Premium " in full
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Tue 20th Jul 2010
Lib Dem party membership grew by a remarkable 14% in the first half of this year, according to official figures released by the party in England. Thousands of new members have joined the party since the election and the coalition agreement was reached, with the party also having greater success in retaining current members than in previous years.
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Read "Thousands of new members join Lib Dems" in full
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Mon 19th Jul 2010
The European Parliament has approved a reworked EU-US agreement on access to European citizens' banking data for the tracking of terrorist finance, after rejecting an interim deal in February on the grounds that it insufficiently safeguarded privacy. Work to improve the data protection safeguards, such as shorter storage times and stronger supervision and redress rights, was led by MEPs from the ALDE (Lib Dem) group.
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Read "Lib Dem MEPs use Lisbon Treaty to safeguard citizens' privacy" in full
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Sat 17th Jul 2010
South East Lib Dem MEP Sharon Bowles has slammed both UKIP and the BNP for voting against the tough new laws to introduce caps on top bankers´ cash bonuses, which was overwhelmingly voted through the European Parliament by 625 in favour to 28 against, with 37 abstentions. In effect, UKIP and BNP MEPs voted against the legislation in order to keep the status quo, which has seen huge bonus packages continue to be handed out despite unprecedented government intervention.
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Read "Sharon Bowles MEP slams UKIP and BNP for voting against caps on bankers´ bonuses" in full
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Sat 17th Jul 2010
South East Lib Dem MEP Sharon Bowles, who chairs the European Parliament's influential Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee, has hailed the new EU law to rein in bankers´ bonuses as a landmark success. The tough new rules voted through the European parliament will be implemented in time for this year's bonus payout. This will stop bank directors such as Fred Goodwin walking away with excessive bonus style pension pots if their bank fails.
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Read "Sharon Bowles MEP hails victory over bankers´ bonuses and casino banking" in full
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Tue 13th Jul 2010
The Conservative administration at County Hall has today announced cuts to the County Council's budget. Responding to the allocation of the cuts, the Leader of the Liberal Democrat main opposition group, Cllr Hazel Watson said: "I disagree with the allocation of the cuts by the Conservative administration. The £3.9m cut to front-line services for Children and Young people is excessive. This will be very damaging to services for vulnerable children and young people in Surrey. It was only about two years ago that children's services were rated inadequate by Government and these cuts will not help to improve the service."
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Read "Surrey Lib Dems oppose Tory cuts" in full
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Wed 7th Jul 2010
On May 5th 2011, as well as elections for Borough and District Councils, there will be a National Referendum on whether to adopt the Alternative Vote - a fairer voting system where voters can rank the candidates 1, 2, 3 etc instead of marking just one with an X.
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Read "Local Elections and a Referendum" in full
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Tue 22nd Jun 2010
Last week Jane Kulka, Lib Dem Parliamentary Spokesperson for Reigate, attended Surrey County Council's consultation meeting for the School Special Bus review. The county council are looking for savings in all areas that they fund. "SCC Officers presented their case for cutting some services, she said, "However there were some serious and obvious flaws and omissions in their presentation".
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Read "Surrey taken for a ride by Bus Companies" in full
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Tue 22nd Jun 2010
After months of worry over the uncertainty of the future of Surrey's bus services, there was some surprising good news recently for residents of Reigate, Woking and Spelthorne following the first phase of a county wide bus review triggered by a decision last year to slash millions from the transport budget.
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Read "Lib Dem Pressure brings Good News for Bus Users" in full
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Wed 16th Jun 2010
Despite a call by Lib Dem county councillor Colin Taylor for a quick decision in principle, SCC Tories have voted to defer any decision on the Lib Dem proposal to return to the more democratic Committee System. Instead the proposal will be referred to a Select Committee.
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Read "County Tories defer decision" in full
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Fri 11th Jun 2010
Surrey County Council is set to make decisions at its meeting on 15 June 2010 about new rules allowing Surrey residents to present petitions at meetings of the full Council and call for debates on them. These rule changes are needed for the Council to comply with new government legislation. The Liberal Democrats are calling for amendments to the new petition rules proposed by the Council to make it easier for Surrey residents to have their say and influence Council decisions.
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Read "Let Surrey Residents make a difference, say Lib Dems" in full
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Wed 9th Jun 2010
Various organisations across Surrey will be taking part in the fun and friendly Surrey Cycle Challenge to see who can get the most staff to riding their bikes as much as possible from 14 June to the 27 June.
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Read "Surrey Cycle Challenge" in full
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Tue 8th Jun 2010
Following on from the various Focus Groups and the On-line Survey, Surrey County Council will be presenting their initial conclusions and options at four open Area Meetings for Parents, Head Teachers and local Councillors.
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Read "School Specials Update" in full
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Tue 8th Jun 2010
The Liberal Democrats on Surrey County Council have called for an independent investigation into problems within the Children's Service in Surrey. This follows a Channel 4 television programme "Dispatches: undercover social worker" broadcast on the 7 June, which filmed an undercover family support worker working for the Children's Service in Surrey.
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Read "Liberal Democrats call for investigation into Surrey's Children's Service" in full
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Fri 28th May 2010
The County Council's Conservative administration has recently decided to allow members of the public to submit petitions at meetings of the whole Council, not just at committee meetings. This is something that the Liberal Democrat group at County Hall have requested many times in order to open up the Council, but which until now has always been refused by the Conservative administration, even as recently as March this year.
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Read "Petitions to the County Council" in full
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Tue 25th May 2010
The Liberal Democrats on Surrey County Council have for many years regularly suggested that the County Council could make significant savings by reducing its reliance on costly agency staff by reducing the number of agency staff and using its own directly-employed staff instead. At last someone has listened.
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Read "Agency Staff Savings" in full
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Sat 22nd May 2010
Improving services for disabled children was one of the requirements of the Improvement Notice issued to Surrey County Council in 2008, after inspectors said Surrey services for vulnerable children and young people were 'inadequate'. Yet Ruth House, the residential facility for respite care attached to Freemantles School for autistic children, is reducing the number of beds offered from twenty to ten, whilst the opening of Applewood, the new children's home at Banstead built to provide respite care for disabled children with complex needs, has been deferred, even though it has recently been approved by Ofsted as ready for use.
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Read "Cuts in Respite Care for Disabled Children" in full
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Wed 19th May 2010
For years services for young people such as the Youth Development Service have been Surrey's Cinderella. Budgets have been cut, with staff posts left unfilled and then frozen.This year a re-organisation at the top takes away the Youth Development Officers who lead the work in each Borough and District and further managers, replacing all thirteen posts with just four operations managers to run youth work for the whole county.
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Read "Youth Work - Cinderella Services at the Cutting Edge" in full
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Archive of earlier News Stories
 News Story Feed(v1.0).
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