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Shadow Communities Secretary and Shadow Treasury Minister visit Portsmouth to back Stephen Morgan

By 26 November 2019No Comments

Today, 2017 General Election Winner Stephen Morgan welcomed two front bench big hitters to his home city. Andrew Gwynne (Shadow Communities Secretary) and Lyn Brown (Shadow Treasury Minister), both Labour grandees, visited Portsmouth to declare their support for Stephen ahead of the 2019 General Election.

The visit began with Stephen Morgan, alongside Shadow Communities Secretary Andrew Gwynne, presenting a cheque outside the civic offices denoting the amount that the Conservatives and Lib Dem’s had cut from Portsmouth City Council’s budget.

Stephen Morgan said:

“Under the Tories and Lib Dems our city has been consistently neglected, ignored and forgotten. £73 million pounds has been slashed from our budgets and it Portsmouth people who are paying the price. Rising homelessness with thousands on the council waiting list, less school funding and a social care crisis.

Tory cuts, which have been deliberately targeted at the poorest areas of the country, have plunged our councils into crisis and pushed many services to breaking point. Decades of privatisation and outsourcing have hollowed out council capacity, taken money out of communities and undermined democratic accountability.”

Stephen Morgan has a record of delivery when it comes to standing up for services we all rely on and local authorities across the country.

He has grilled Government Ministers in parliament demanding an end to cuts, spoken out in debates, written to council officers thanking them for their services, specifically taken action over cuts to city schools by bringing teachers up to parliament and visited 10 Downing Street to raise awareness of the damage local government reductions are doing.

Shadow Communities Secretary, Andrew Gwynne said:

“It is evident from speaking to people on the doorstep today with Stephen that he is doing an outstanding job in representing the concerns of his constituents.

I know first-hand how much he cares for his community through our work together in the Shadow Communities team and I sincerely hope that he is able to continue his vital efforts for Portsmouth South following the General election.

Portsmouth needs an MP with a track record of fighting the city’s corner, Stephen has consistently gone above and beyond and is the only person capable of beating the Tories in Portsmouth South.”

Stephen Morgan said:

“I am delighted to back Labour’s manifesto commitment to reverse the Tory decade of austerity for local government and our aim to restore council spending powers to 2010 levels over the lifetime of the Parliament.

While those who make decisions in Whitehall can seem distant and detached, our local councillors live among us, shopping on the same high street, using the same parks and leisure centres and sending their children to the same schools.

It is essential that they are given adequate power, funding and resource from central Government so that they can look out for our communities.”

Stephen Morgan then lobbied the Shadow Communities Secretary along with the Treasury Minister urging proper funding for Portsmouth.
The visit culminated in the Labour representative chatting to local residents on the doorstep with Stephen Morgan.