Reform UK Rutland and Stamford Candidate Christopher Clowes speaks in Rutland about the general election 2024
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00:00 So I'm here this evening with Christopher Clouse who is the Reform UK representative for the county of Rutland.
00:08 Christopher, we've been here this evening with some of your colleagues, Richard Tice and Anthony Antonio.
00:14 Rutland is a county that you know. What do you feel you have to do to persuade the voters of this county
00:25 to change from Conservative, which it has been for a long time, to Reform. Where do you need to be?
00:32 Well I need to be everywhere at once but it is a county that isn't not used to change.
00:40 When Rutland Water was installed, you know, there was a huge amount of change.
00:44 When there was the campaign for Rutland independence, there was a huge amount of change going on as everything changed hands.
00:52 And so when it comes to Rutland though, it is a rural area, it is a way of life.
00:57 That is, people move here for a certain lifestyle. It's about protecting that and protecting what is entailed in that.
01:06 And so the beauty, the natural beauty we have, the beautiful towns, the way that everything comes together
01:13 is something that should be promoted but then also there needs to be more stuff, regular buses,
01:19 there needs to be the ability to get around easier and protection for people with cars.
01:25 Now the party itself are putting forward 630 candidates at the forthcoming election this year
01:31 and there are, so we are led to believe, a lot of voters who are sitting on the fence.
01:37 Both Tory, Conservatives, Labour, Liberals, Social Democrats, all in there.
01:43 How do you direct your thoughts to them to say, I'm here, vote for me in Rutland, you just mentioned we are a rural county.
01:53 Where do you go with that message?
01:55 Well when it comes to it, it's the increasing stuff like services, it's, you know, for example,
02:01 the potential access to healthcare here being an issue, where there is no major hospitals for 20 miles around.
02:07 So it would be being pro these factors on one side but then, you know, understanding that the small businesses here
02:15 need to thrive on the high street.
02:17 Within Rutland it is all dependent on very much people live here because it is pleasant
02:22 and it is about keeping how pleasant it is and not having these giant mega projects necessarily come here.
02:30 Now one of the points you made this evening was that the local county council has a large number of people
02:38 on a permanent wage amounting to something like 30% of the entire budget
02:42 and yet we've got an awful lot of people in this county who are very angry about the closure of things like the leisure centre.
02:50 What would be your message to them specifically?
02:53 We should be here to protect these issues. We need to address the fly-tipping problem that's happening in Rutland as we speak.
03:01 My understanding is obviously the Conservatives have now set in an appeal to their voters,
03:06 to the rural crime units to show that they're out and about and doing something.
03:10 But the fly-tipping's there and the problem is the councils require an external contractor to come and remove the fly-tipping.
03:17 So even if you put your, if someone fly-tips outside of an actual tip, they hire someone else to come out and fix it.
03:26 Despite it being something that's a very easy project to fix. So that costs more money.
03:33 So when it comes to it, it becomes a common sense audit it and saying, you know,
03:38 is this council spending money in a reasonable manner or is our closures of community areas that are important,
03:49 are they acceptable for what they seem to be? I remember the statue, there seems to be this notion of the statue of the Queen
03:57 that's across the road from here was funded by the council. It wasn't, it was funded privately.
04:03 But the, you know, would that have been an acceptable expenditure for a council?
04:08 You know, that could have been seen as a vanity project. And so when it comes to Rutland,
04:15 you know, there's some simple things for moving forward that people want and having community areas is definitely one of them.
04:24 Now we've heard the leader of the Reform UK party this evening, Richard Tice, say that he imagines we'll have an election probably in November.
04:32 So we're going to be seeing a lot of you in the next few months.
04:36 Yes. Do you have a message for the incumbent MP, Alicia Kearns?
04:42 Off the top of my head, it's, it's, you know, we're here to make change.
04:48 You have spent your last four years very much focusing on your foreign select committee.
04:53 And I know that you are putting in a huge amount of effort locally.
04:57 And it's very unlucky for me that I have to have a full time job to do this. But I look forward to the competition.
05:05 Christopher, thank you very much for your time this evening. It's been a pleasure. Thank you.