Farron lists Pre-Budget Report demands for South Lakeland

2.00.00pm BST (GMT +0100) Tue 9th Oct 2007

Local MP, Tim Farron has issued three demands to the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, who delivers his first Pre-Budget Report today. The PBR, which is traditionally delivered in November, is intended as a precursor to the Budget itself and gives an update on the state of the nation's finances as well as announcing proposed new tax measures.

Mr Farron has given Mr Darling three measures that he wants to see implemented for the benefit of Westmorland and Lonsdale:

Scrap Vehicle Excise Duty for Mountain Rescue vehicles - Tim has been lobbying Treasury Ministers on this issue for several months.

Change the Department for Health's funding formula to give a fairer deal for rural areas.

Introduce measure to curb excessive second home ownership and provide funding for affordable housing projects in rural areas.

Ahead of the statement this afternoon, Tim said:

"The three challenges I am issuing are extremely important issues in our area. Mountain Rescue perform a vital job, for example they provided invaluable help after the Grayrigg derailment, scrapping VED on their vehicles is essential for them to survive.

"Under the current funding formula rural areas are significantly short-changed by the Department of Health, I want to see a complete overhaul of the system to fix this.

"Finally it is of the utmost importance that something is done to stop excessive second home ownership in our area and provide affordable housing. The area is haemorrhaging young people because they can't afford to get on the property ladder, we need to address this situation sooner rather than later."