news story

19th November 2008

Local MP Short-listed for Two National Awards

Northavon MP Steve Webb has been short-listed for two national awards because of his campaigning work and his efforts to communicate with his constituents.

The first award is the annual "Charity Champions" award, the results of which will be announced on Wednesday 10th December.  Every year charities in a wide range of sectors are invited to nominate MPs who they believed have worked particularly hard in support of the groups that the charities serve.  This year Steve Webb has been nominated by the charity Help the Aged for his longstanding campaigning efforts on behalf of pensioners.  The two other MPs nominated in this capacity are Deputy Speaker Sir Alan Hazelhurst and fellow Lib Dem MP Lynne Featherstone. Full details of the citation are on the website . 

Steve Webb said:

"I am honoured to have been nominated for this award by Help the Aged. In recent years the campaigning work that I have been doing on behalf of pensioners, both in my constituency and around the country, has yielded great fruit in the form of millions of pounds in backdated pensions for tens of thousands of people. But getting to this point has taken many years of sometimes fruitless campaigning, so an award nomination like this is a great encouragement".

In addition to the charity champion nomination, Steve Webb found himself one of three finalists this week in the British Computer Society's annual awards for the best MP website.

The other two finalists were Labour MP Derek Wyatt, who eventually won the award, and Lib Dem John Barrett.  Steve has in the past been highly commended for his website which contains regular updates on the MP's campaigns on behalf of local residents, and in 2005 won a Channel 4 political award for 'e-democracy' for his pioneering use of e-mail to test the views of local residents. 

The Lib Dem MP now regularly consults more than 7,000 local people for their views via e-mail, as well as maintaining contact in more traditional forms for residents who are not on the internet.