By Will Pickworth
December 10 2019, 10.25
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Sir Ed Davey has ruled out a Liberal Democrat post-election pact with Labour or the Conservatives.
Sir Ed, who received his knighthood in 2016 for ‘political and public service’, is aiming to secure his sixth election victory in Kingston and Surbiton.
After losing in 2015, he was re-elected in 2017 with a 4,124 majority.
Sir Ed said: “I don’t mind working with other parties but we couldn’t work with Jeremy Corbyn or Boris Johnson.
“Both those leaders have taken their party to quite extreme positions – the Conservatives so far to the hard right that they get endorsements from people like Tommy Robinson.
“There is a real shift with what I would call life-long Conservatives saying that they won’t vote for Boris Johnson.
“And equally Labour to the very hard left. I worry very much about Jeremy Corbyn policies so there’s no way I’d ever vote for Corbyn as PM.”
Sir Ed has campaigned on education issues including winning £8.2m for extra primary school places in Kingston in 2010 and helping secure the opening of Lime Tree Primary School and the Kingston Community school. He believes that education is the biggest issue facing the constituency.
He said: “Head teachers are really cross and Conservative budget cuts have created huge problems. Schools have been laying off teachers and teaching assistants as a result.”
Sir Ed was Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change from 2012-2015 and he is critical of the government’s environmental record.
He said: “It’s a whole chapter of bad decisions for the climate. The Conservatives have let down our future.
“By leaving the European table on climate, that is a climate crime. “It is immoral to leave that table when this international issue is so dramatically important – we’d still fry so you have got no choice.”
Despite losing his seat in 2015, Sir Ed never had any hesitation in re-standing in 2017.
He said: “I’m passionate about liberalism so I had to come back and fight and we did win and now I’m hopefully playing a positive role.
“Judge me on my record! I’ve campaigned very hard for this area and been pretty successful and I would like the privilege of being their MP to work hard for them again.”
Read more about what’s important to south west London constituencies in our 24-page General Election preview special.
