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Hi-tech companies are forging ahead
IT HAS been a while since I gave readers an account of a day of visits throughout my constituency, so here's a bit about last Friday.
I was delighted to be accompanied by Lauren, a soon-to-be third year law student at Exeter University who's spending her holidays at home in Horsham. Lauren was keen to experience a day-in-the-life of a busy constituency MP and she certainly got a taster!
Our first appointment was at Billingshurst company, The Printed Word.
I'd been invited to see for myself how, despite the current economic climate, this family business is expanding. With the help of some very serious new equipment, The Printed Word is proudly the first UK company to offer totally bespoke hardback covers. Soon, individuals and businesses will be able to log-on, create their own designs and receive their notebooks, diaries, year books in the post – fantastic!
Next was North Heath Lane company, Envitia. Again, I'd been invited to visit as their local MP but I was delighted to find out that their services – which, in a nutshell, involve geospatial intelligence technologies – are directly related to my responsibilities as Minister for the Cabinet Office. I'm working on reducing costs within government IT programmes and my visit was incredibly useful and very timely indeed.
We also visited one of the largest housing associations to cover the Horsham area – Southern Housing, based in the centre of the town.
It owns hundreds of local properties and houses well over a thousand of my constituents. I was keen to know about issues affecting the company and its tenants. I've also arranged a catch-up with the management of Saxon Weald, another significant housing association in the area.
Peppered around these visits were a number of meetings with local people in my Horsham office and a couple of home visits. The day concluded with one of my busiest advice surgeries for some time. Quite why demand is running so high, I'm not sure, but fortunately we managed to squeeze everyone in.
Mindful of people's privacy, some of the general issues that were raised included care for local people suffering from dementia; frontline cuts to ambulance services; strengthening Britain's ties with India; services for young people with epilepsy; Equitable Life; local provision for children with special educational needs; planned NHS reforms; strengthening the role of parish councils and public sector unemployment.
Surgeries are truly at the heart of the role of a constituency MP – they are essential in really understanding local issues and the views of local people.
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Weather for Horsham
Thursday 24 May 2012
Today
Thunderstorm
Temperature: 14 C to 26 C
Wind Speed: 9 mph
Wind direction: North east
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 12 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 20 mph
Wind direction: East
