Yahoo News Conservatives face election battle to hold onto Herefordshire seats
This is part of a series of articles. In the run-up to the election, we will be profiling all of Herefordshire's prospective parliamentary candidates. Here, we take a look at who is in the running for the Conservatives.
Herefordshire’s two parliamentary constituencies are, suddenly, marginal – and the county’s Conservative incumbents have a fight on their hands ahead of next week’s general election.
In Hereford and South Herefordshire, Jesse Norman is campaigning on his track record on local issues over the 14 years he has held the seat.
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He has said it took 12 years of “campaigning, lobbying and twisting arms” before Hereford’s New Model Institute for Technology and Engineering opened in 2020, and he remains a champion of NMITE as it continues to grow.
Mr Norman was also a staunch advocate of the Stronger Hereford programme of government-backed improvements to the city, several of which have already borne fruit.
He also campaigned for years for an action plan with a single head to fix pollution in the river Wye, which the Government eventually announced this April - though not to universal acclaim.
And he has also backed the re-opening of a railway station at Pontrilas in the southwest of the county, which the county’s formal plans now commit to progressing in the year ahead.
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“Rather than attacking opponents, I want to show there is a better way of doing politics,” he said.
He gave his wish to focus on local issues among his reasons for resigning his role as transport minister back in November, one of several government roles he has held.
Meanwhile Sir Bill Wiggin, MP for North Herefordshire since 2001, is defending an even larger majority.
He has been more prepared to campaign on national issues, saying that the Conservatives “have got the economy back on track” thanks to lower inflation.
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A local farmer and former soldier, he has welcomed the Conservatives commitment to increase defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP.
“I hope voters recognise that we are the only party who will provide the defence, food, and economic security that we all need,” he said.
Locally, he sees the key issues as the county’s hospital, rivers, and roads – the latter “getting better now that key repair work can take place, thanks to the Conservative government and council’s commitment”.
Several polls show both seats becoming too close to call since the Prime Minister’s election announcement last month, with the July 4 result still very much in the balance.
