Lib Dem PPCs selected for City of Chester and Ellesmere Port & Neston

A local party press release brings the news:

Two locals have been named by the Chester, Ellesmere Port and Neston Liberal Democrats as their candidates for the next general election for the City of Chester and the Ellesmere Port and Neston constituencies.

Rob Herd, 38, is a languages teacher from Chester and will contend the City of Chester constituency. Elizabeth Jewkes, veteran Liberal Democrat campaigner and business owner from Ellesmere Port will fight the Ellesmere Port and Neston constituency.

Rob is a Law and French graduate from the University of Leeds, who went on to study the Legal
Practitioners Course at Nottingham College of Law. Whilst at the University of Leeds, Rob was President of the Erasmus Society. He later qualified as a teacher with a postgraduate certificate in education and a Masters in education from Liverpool John Moores University. Rob first came to Chester in 2009 to work for The Living Room on St Werburgh Street and was General Manager there for two years. He now lives in Great Boughton with his partner, Mark.

Rob’s passion for social mobility, social equality and the next generation is clear through his work in schools as a Head of Modern Languages in schools in St Helens and in Chester. Rob has served the population of Chester as a governor at Boughton Heath Academy in Great Boughton for four years and he is currently a trustee at Cheshire, Warrington and Halton Race & Equality Centre. He has been a member of the Liberal Democrats since the age of eighteen.

Rob would like to see Chester better promoted on the national stage and a more robust response to the really worrying cost of living crisis. He is a passionate advocate for education and social mobility, environmental standards, electoral and voting system reform and bringing integrity, transparency, and openness back to politics.

Rob says: “It is an honour to be selected to represent the liberal voices of Chester and to be able to stand in the next general election. I have been moved to stand for election because I am fed up with the level of public debate and the mismanagement of things like the cost of living crisis, sewage, track and trace and social care. I am committed to a Chester where we won’t have to worry about sewage in the River Dee and where the Countess of Chester Hospital isn’t straining under the weight of under-funding and stressed out employees. I fully intend to conduct myself with integrity in being a voice for everyone from every section of our diverse community.”

Elizabeth lives in Ellesmere Port and since 2017 has run a successful business in the town centre. She has a degree in psychology from the Open University.

Elizabeth has previously stood as a candidate for the General Election in both Ellesmere Port and Chester. Last March, Elizabeth was described by Stephen Bush of the Financial Times as “the most influential Liberal Democrat since 1987”. In 2008, under the then Labour government, everyone earning over £120 a week had to pay tax. Elizabeth wanted working people to be able to keep more of the money they had earned and so created the policy of raising the income tax threshold. She campaigned to have the policy adopted by the Lib Dems. As part of the Coalition Government, the Lib Dems, put her policy into practice and now the lowest paid, no longer pay tax.

Elizabeth is now part of the Federal Policy Committee of the Liberal Democrats where she continues to influence policy decisions. Elizabeth was also described by the New Statesman as “the woman who has done more to undermine the British state than anyone since Boney”.

Elizabeth is passionate about the environment. Her business, Grace Tea Room, was the first business in Ellesmere Port to sign up to ‘Plastic Free Ellesmere Port’ by committing to reduce the use of single use plastics. She is also committed to electoral reform, including proportional representation and local government. Since the merger of local authorities into Cheshire West and Chester council, Elizabeth has run a campaign to get a town council for Ellesmere Port.

Elizabeth says: “There are 162 town and parish councils across CWAC, Ellesmere Port is the only major town without its own council. The people of the Port should be able to decide what is best for our town”.

Elizabeth is married to Kurt. They have three daughters and a son and are have just welcomed their seventh grandchild.

See all the Liberal Democrat PPCs selected and publicly announced so far here.

Keep up with news about Lib Dem selections

If you’d like to be notified by email when further posts about Liberal Democrat selections appear on this blog, just sign up here. (Note: if you’re already signed up for a daily email alert with all my new blog posts, then there’s no need to sign up for these alerts too as the stories will also be in the full daily digest.)