THE MP who you, the voters of Wyre Forest, choose this week will represent your interests in Parliament for the next five years. This is such an important decision.

Wyre Forest needs an MP who will help you with the issues you face on your doorstep, as well as nationally. Sometimes these are one and the same.

Wyre Forest is suffering under the recession. Unemployment has more than doubled. Wages are below average. People across the whole region are worried about their jobs, their mortgages, their credit card debts, their savings, and their pensions.

Businesses need help from an MP who understands business. Our local economy needs help from an MP who has a background in economics. To persuade new investors to come to our district we need an MP who understands investment.

With 27 years experience of business, finance and economics, I am the only candidate with the experience needed for Wyre Forest’s current problems.

We need an MP with influence. Wyre Forest’s next MP must be able to punch above his weight by having a good team around him. It’s about the support an MP gets by having friends in Westminster, and how he uses that support to the benefit of his constituents.

There are many local issues that I want to champion – including continuing to improve local health services. But this election is also about who is going to govern our country.

Wyre Forest is a key constituency in this election and without this seat voting Conservative, we will wake up on May 7 and Gordon Brown will still be Prime Minster. If we are to change our government, Wyre Forest must vote Conservative: it is that simple.

In the six years that I have been working as an unpaid volunteer here in Wyre Forest, I have got to know the area well. This is a great place, but it can do better.

I have chosen Wyre Forest as home for my family and I really do want it to do better. Wyre Forest can, and will, do better with a Conservative MP.

I am absolutely determined that, after one or two terms of my being your MP, local unemployment will have fallen, the average wage will have increased, social problems will have decreased, fewer shops will stand empty, and visitors will be on the up.

But for these things to happen you must choose Conservative.