John Baron

Conservative Party | Billericay and District

Points of View

The Fun Walk

45 local charities and good causes have now registered to join this year’s annual Fun Walk at Barleylands Farm on 22 May.

This is excellent news and many people will benefit. When we first started the idea back in 2002, we had just 6 charities participating and the total money raised was £6,000. Last year over £25,000 was raised, and this year we are hoping to raise even more money.

One of the good aspects of the walk is that, because the Committee organizes the walk, participants are free to get on with raising sponsorship prior to the event.  In addition, because we have been lucky to attract corporate sponsorship into a central pot, the charities receive further monies in addition to that raised themselves.

Furthermore, we are quite relaxed as to who benefits – you do not have to be a registered charity as long as your project is deemed by the Committee to be worthy of support.

Preparations are well advanced to try and make this another fun afternoon, with a live band, barbeque, refreshments and other entertainments. In addition this year, we are encouraging all charities and projects to use the Barn facilities to set out their stalls in order to help raise awareness of their particular cause.

If you would like more details, please contact Mrs Annie Akinin on 01268 520765.

International Aid

Fundraising for the Tsunami appeal showed just how generous people can be, but it is governments that could do much more to help the world’s poor.  An example is the EU overseas aid budget. This budget is meant to help relieve global poverty but has all too often been used for political ends.

For example, recent history shows that the top 10 beneficiaries have been countries bordering the EU. Meanwhile, prior to joining, Poland was receiving twice as much aid as Latin America and Asia combined.

This is clearly wrong and I have raised the issue with Mr Blair at PMQs. Britain should withhold the £850 million we presently send to the EU overseas aid budget, and distribute the money more fairly ourselves.

We would then stand a better chance of meeting the UN's target for spending 0.7% of Gross National Product on overseas aid by 2013, and stop the EU playing petty politics with the poor of the world.