Last Friday, students from Norton Hill School held a special debate involving four of the five parliamentary candidates for North East Somerset for their sixth formers, many of whom will be eligible to vote in this year's general election.
A Level politics students were given the opportunity to meet each of the PPCs and talk to them prior to the debate, which was sponsored by local community radio station, Somer Valley FM.
The event then took place in the school hall, with the PPCs joining Norton Hill Head Boy, Shyam Sawhney, and Deputy Member of Youth Parliament for B&NES, Beccy Thompson, who is a Norton Hill student, on stage in front of fellow sixth formers to host a debate on policies, both locally and nationally. Green Party PPC, Katy Boyce, was unable to attend due to illness.
In a move for voters to find out more about their local PPCs, The Journal has this week released a video featuring all of the candidates, who were invited along to our office in Midsomer Norton to tell us more about themselves and to encourage more people to vote.
Meanwhile, local manifesto pledges are being launched, with Labour releasing theirs this week. Cllr John Bull (Leader of B&NES Labour Group) said: "Residents have told us their priorities. If elected, Labour councillors will tackle those issues that most matter to local people, including housing, transport, a decent standard of living, education and health.
"Labour will tackle the failure of the housing market to meet the needs of the less well-off, promote better, fairly-priced public transport, push for the Living Wage to be paid by all local employers, ensure collaboration between education providers and the Council and hold NHS health providers to account for their services.
"Residents are utterly dismayed with the effects of this Tory/Lib Dem coalition government and the support given to it by the Lib-Dem administration here in B&NES. Labour has excellent, committed candidates across the whole of Bath and North East Somerset who work to ensure that they address the needs of local people."
Meanwhile, Conservative Councillors in Bath and North East Somerset have pledged to undertake a comprehensive 'root-and-branch' review of all the Council's spending in order to cut out waste and increase efficiency if they are running the Council after this May's local elections.
Conservatives have said that by undertaking a comprehensive review of the way in which B&NES spends taxpayers' money, they would be in a stronger position to protect the vital local services that residents rely upon whilst keeping the level of Council Tax down.
As part of their spending review, Conservatives have said they would seek to streamline the Council's departmental and management structure to increase efficiency, undertake more collaborative and shared-service arrangements with other authorities and public bodies to save on back-office costs, improve the Council's procedures for overseeing major capital projects to make them more robust, further reduce the Council's office accommodation costs and consult residents on the possibility of reducing the number of Councillors, as some other Councils have done, to help save taxpayers money.
If they take control of the Council after the election, Conservatives have said that they would start work on the spending review immediately in order to establish a long-term financial plan for the Council.
Conservative Shadow spokesman for Resources, Cllr Charles Gerrish, said: "If we are to meet the financial challenge all Councils will face over the coming years yet still provide the best possible services to our residents, B&NES will need to undertake a top-to-toe, root-and-branch review of the way it spends taxpayers' money.
"Sadly, under the Lib-Dems, what we've witnessed in B&NES are endless project over-runs, a failure to tackle wasteful spending and the legacy of a £1.5 million black-hole in the Council's budget plans.
"That means we would have to look at the Council's budget from the ground up, producing a long-term financial plan which drives out any inefficiencies and puts the Council on a surer footing for the years ahead, so that we can better protect our vital local services and keep our Council Tax rates down."