Louth & Horncastle Lib Dem candidate Ross Pepper on the NHS and making history

As the country prepares to go to the polls on Thursday July 4 for the General Elections, the Liberal Democrats’ Ross Pepper believes that this is the year for history to be made for the constituency.

Louth and Horncastle were once their own individual constituencies until the 1980s, 1983, Horncastle was moved into the new seat of Gainsborough and Horncastle, while Louth was moved into the East Lindsey constituency until 1997, when the present Louth & Horncastle constituency was formed.

The last time a party other than Conservative was in power in Louth was Margaret Wintringham in 1921, and Horncastle’s was Samuel Pattinson in 1922 – coincedentally both Liberal Democrats – and Ross said that this is the year for his party, 100 years on from the history-making Lib Dems:

"I believe we can overturn this government with another Lib Dem MP. It will be a good way to mark the anniversary of the last Lib Dems in power here.”

A Liberal Democrat member for nearly 20 years, said that he knew that the party would be suitable for him during a discussion on the Iraq war during his A-Level Politics course.

"I was the only one who was arguing against us going to war with Iraq,” he said, “And when I went to the Freshers Fair in September at the University of Lincoln, there was a Lib Dem stall there and that was that.

"I found that their views on pretty much everything – LGBTQ rights and their commitment to the environment – aligned the most with my own.”

If the Liberal Democrats receive the most votes on Thursday and Ross is elected the new MP for Louth and Horncastle, he said that an overhaul of the NHS would be top of his list of priorities for our constituency:

"The NHS is a very personal thing to me as I had a life-saving operation six years ago, and it’s the most important thing we have.

"Our commitment to be able to get the NHS back on level footing with 8,000 new GPs and for people to be able to see their GPs as soon as possible and within a week.

"We also desperately need better dental care – Lincolnshire is one of the worst in the country for dentists and while there’s a lot of investment in places, I feel that Lincolnshire gets left behind and I will shout from the roof-tops to make sure that doens’t happen anymore.

"My message is, you need a local champion and someone who will fight for you every step of the way, and I will do that.”

In what has been described as one of the most interesting General Elections in years, Ross said that while he doesn’t take any notice of the polls, this could be the year that Louth & Horncastle is under a different rosette by this time next week:

"I don’t take any notice of polls, the most important one is the one that happens on the night,” he said, “A lot of people have said they feel they have been let down over the last 14 years, and others don’t trust Labour, so it will be very interesting.

"There’s been a lot of positive feedback in this election, and even if people think a vote for anything other than Labour of Conservative is a wasted vote, every vote counts.”