Janice Spalding - why vote for me?

It has been a week since I got the phone call about my mother's death and it still seems a bit unreal that she has gone. I suppose that won't hit me until I fly up to Newcastle this Sunday. So why am I sharing this with you? Well it has made me stop and think what am I doing standing in this election? What is my purpose? What do I think I shall achieve? Will I make a difference? I know I don't have the answers to all these questions but I can try - if you don't try you will never know.

I have reached a certain age when I want to use my work experience to help the next generation to have a good opportunity, training and be able to enjoy life. Why? I am a Software Engineer and I see there is a big problem looming. Let me explain, when I started work for a UK Software company the average age of the company was 25, I was then 23. Today the average age of where I work now is 55, I am 53. If someone leaves the company it now takes an average of 9 months to find a replacement, and that is if you can find a replacement. The company is restricted to employing UK citizens only (for Security reasons).This recruitment process is extremely expensive for the business and having shortfalls in staff does affect the service offered to customers. This would explain UK companies recruiting from abroad.

So how can we fix this? We have to invest in training and schools, and not have this endless fixation about testing and league tables. Having qualified teachers in subjects they know about. Teaching life skills is very important not just subjects you can test but music, arts they encourage social skills, confidence which are invaluable in any field of work. For my last company I was a Graduate mentor and experienced what these bright kids had not been taught. This is a problem, I am an engineer, I want to fix it.

This is what concerns me, this is what drives me - but who do you believe? If you don't know who to believe or trust - look at the people you can vote for - and ask would you buy a used car from this person? A Member of Parliament is after all just another person.

PS The Van is not for sale!