IT IS understandable that David Drew’s re-election is being described as a surprise but I have to say it wasn’t a surprise to me.

What I think definitely is a surprise is that 29,000 people voted for Neil Carmichael.

Could any one of them please tell us what Mr Carmichael has done for this constituency.

He says that he set up Festomane but that’s just a posh name for a careers convention.

He says he played a key role in establishing Berkeley University Technical College and pressed for another railway station in Stonehouse.

So he has renamed a careers convention, played a key role and “pressed” for something else.

He overlooked telling us, amongst other things, that he was voted “The Beer Champion”, that Charles Alfred Cripps was a Stroud MP a long time ago, that Lord John Russell gave his name to parts of Stroud and that “fuel poverty is something we should watch out for”.

No suggestion that he or his colleagues would do anything about it, just that we should watch out for it.

Clearly there are many who would vote for a cardboard box if it had a blue rosette stuck to it but what they don’t seem to realise is that by doing so they are trying to deprive the rest of us of a fantastic constituency MP.

Also, one has to assume they have not been affected by austerity personally so they don’t care about those who are.

Could one of the 29,000 tell us how austerity has improved the overall state of things in this country?

Please don’t try and suggest that if Jeremy Corbyn had been in charge things would have been etc etc because he isn’t.

What we know is that with a Tory government, of sorts, we have people begging and living on our streets, a reliance on foodbanks, spiralling personal debt, an NHS ‘running on empty’ and the list goes on and on.

What aspect of this situation are the 29,000 so proud of they want it to continue?

Howard Price

Nailsworth