The West Midlands mayoral campaign is a great opportunity for us to get our distinctive Liberal Democrat messaging out there, to promote the party and to support our vital local elections.

I am focusing on three overriding principles in my campaign to become the mayor of the West Midlands.

Essential services like water, gas and electricity, are the backbones of modern life. They keep our homes warm, our cars running, we rely on them every day. But many of us are overpaying for these essential services.

The Liberal Democrats want to ensure utility companies are run for the benefit of consumers, rather than solely for profit.

All over the country, there are hundreds of thousands of people living in areas where Liberal Democrats are running the council and are in charge of public money and budgets of more than £2bn.

From Cumbria to Cornwall, from York to Eastbourne, to Bath to Bedford. In Oxfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, Surrey, in Devon and the Midlands, Gloucestershire, Somerset, Hampshire and London, and many many more places as well.

Liberal Democrats are working hard to show their residents what it’s like to live in a place where our values are put into practice every day.

For too long those with disabilities have struggled to obtain secure employment – a struggle intensified by Covid-19. Disabled workers have been disproportionately impacted by furlough, reduced hours and redundancies.

These have been hard times for us all.

Covid has dominated our lives over the past year; Personally, professionally, politically.

Covid has dominated our lives over the past year; Personally, professionally, politically.

We have all needed to find extra resilience, additional emotional resources, extra bandwidth in our efforts to get through these times. A year when we lost people. When people lost jobs and livelihoods. When loneliness became an even bigger killer and when Welsh small businesses were brought to their knees.

But Wales is a resilient nation. Welshness through the centuries has been more than just a political or legal identity. It has been a way of life, a state of mind. Our community spirit has inspired the greatest social reformers who have transformed Britain.