Michael Jones is Horsham’s Labour candidate for the General Election

Horsham Constituency Labour Party is pleased to announce that their candidate for the General Election will be Labour Group Leader on West Sussex County Council, Councillor Michael Jones.

Michael was joined by members and supporters of Horsham library at the Carfax on Saturday afternoon to launch Labour’s campaign locally as the General Election campaign begins to heat up.

Mr Jones said:

“I’m incredibly honoured to have been the party’s choice here in Horsham constituency.  Labour are the clear challengers here, the General Election result in 2017, where we came a very solid second, shows that we are the only alternatives to having a Tory MP, no matter how many bogus bar charts our other opponents may try to circulate.”

 “We’re going to be fighting right across Horsham constituency, certainly in Horsham town itself but also down to Southwater and Billingshurst in the south of the constituency, up to Rusper and Colgate in the north and around to the villages of Ardingley, Balcombe, Copthorne, Crawley Down, Turner’s Hill and Pease Pottage in the east as well.

 “Labour’s going to be campaigning on the issues that matter most to residents and I’ll be speaking out on their behalf.  Jeremy Quin should pay attention, because we are going to hold him firmly to account for his part in propping up this dismal Tory Government.”

Constituency Secretary of Horsham Labour Party, David Hide said:

“We have secured an absolute star of the Labour movement and Michael is the most experienced Labour politician in West Sussex bar none.  If he is elected as our Member of Parliament here in Horsham constituency, he will be outstanding. 

 “He has exposed so much that has been going wrong at West Sussex County Council over the past few years, and that’s precisely what we need at national Government level as well.  We look forward to a good, constructive campaign.”

Biography for Michael Jones

Michael Jones is a qualified solicitor.  He is Labour Group Leader at West Sussex County Council, where he has been a strong critical voice in holding the Tories to account on a range of issues, leading the Labour voice in West Sussex on important issues such as calling on the council to declare a climate emergency, fighting got the reversal of sweeping fire and rescue service cuts, amenity tip charges, protecting the library service from cuts and also leading a protest against the Tory cuts to the homeless support budgets which looked set to close many vital facilities.  He has also spoken out against the continuing failure of the local Tories to heed local headteachers’ calls for adequate funding for schools.

He has also been a leading critic of the crisis state that the West Sussex Tory leadership has reduced the county council to, following inadequate inspection reports on children’s services and the Fire and Rescue Service and has revealed several high profile examples of poor spending, including on a council drone that has never been flown.

In 2016 Michael was Labour’s candidate in the Sussex-wide election for Police and Crime Commissioner, beating UKIP, the Lib Dems and Greens to face Tory Katy Bourne in the final round, at the same time achieving one of the largest ever votes for a Labour Sussex candidate.

He continues to hold the Commissioner to account as one of the representatives on the Sussex Police and Crime Panel, opposing the Tories’ savage cuts to our Police force.

Michael has been a long standing campaigner for Labour across Sussex, including previously being Labour’s Parliamentary candidate in Bexhill & Battle and Bognor Regis & Littlehampton.

A Crawley Borough councillor since 2010, he is also Chair of the council’s Licensing Committee, supporting campaigns on safer drinking and socialising, promoting and enforcing taxi safety and for greater restrictions on Fixed Odds Betting Terminals.

Michael has long fought for more council housing, a Rent Act to protect tenants, a properly funded NHS and schools, and for railways to be renationalised, giving West Sussex commuters a better deal.  When he was Cabinet Member for Housing in Crawley last year, he led a significant and ambitious council house building programme which is housing hundreds of families in need.

As a Cabinet Member at Crawley Borough Council, Michael has devoted himself to supporting local community and voluntary groups so that the town’s diverse community can grow and add even more value to the community.  He helped create the hugely successful Crawley Community awards, now a regular annual event.

A strong community champion and local campaigner, Michael has fought local people’s corner across West Sussex on matters important to them, including successfully campaigning to save 25 children’s playgrounds across Crawley, helping campaign to save local playing fields from development and supporting residents on issues as diverse as calling for action on a crossing where several pedestrians had been injured, to supporting a local Community Forum in extending the conservation area.