Dear Supporters,

What a weekend !  With 449 signatures in three days we are well on the road to our next target of 500 signatures.  Getting the word out there is vital as most people do not know what is being steamrolled through.

The Hampshire County Council Extraordinary General Meeting on Thursday 9th January certainly lived up to its name.  This is where the undemocratic decision to cancel May’s election was taken by our Councillors.  It was 4 hours long, but in full MOTD style we have captured some of the key moments in an edited "highlights" video here.

At just 13 minutes it is of course heavily edited, but you can see what six of the councillors from across the political spectrum had to say.  It’s well worth a watch to get a sense of why we are here.

The outcome of the meeting was Conservative and Labour councillors voted to "postpone" May's election for up to a year.  There would be no May election, nor any other in 2025.  They want the people to be silent.  This has been done under the cover of the Christmas period in the hope that the people would not notice.

So we still need to get word out and build the petition.  We plan to send it to the Secretary of State on 27th January.  This is before the critical date of 31st January when the Government are due to announce whether our region will be included in the Devolution Priority Programme and what will happen to our May elections.

So please do share far and wide.  Let's make sure as many people know about this damaging undemocratic move by the government and HCC. 

Once again, many thanks for your support for democracy.

PS. You can watch the unedited full proceedings here