I have no objections to successful Directors and executives in the private sector being well rewarded. That is a matter for their shareholders and for them. Government cannot get into the business of setting levels of pay throughout UK companies , especially as they have to compete in a global market where talented people and successful companies can take themselves elsewhere if government interferes too much. Government has enough to do, without trying to decide what is fair or reasonable for a Director to be paid.

I do have objections to a few employees in the public sector being paid much larger salaries and bonuses than most others in public service out of taxpayers’ money. I do not think it a good idea to pay large sums at RBS to senior people before they have delivered the profits and the dividends to shareholders that we would like. I am pushing for the government to require the RBS Board to split the RBS Group up , creating a range of new banks and financial service businesses out of the empire they preside over, and sell these on as quickly as possible to the private sector. So far the government and Board has come round to the view that they should sell off the Investment banking businesses, which is a welcome start.

I would reward the Directors at private sector levels for doing this, once they have succeeded. Their bonuses should be based on what they return to the private sector and how much money to get for it. I do not believe for one moment that even Mr Hester can get back all the taxpayers money poured into RBS. We are into damage limitation, into getting the most we can for it, into cutting taxpayers’ risks as quickly as possible. Ministers are not cut out to be bank shareholders. Taxpayers will not take kindly to more losses from the state owned banks. We need a stronger policy to get them off our payroll.

Part of the reason for my proposal is the knowledge that we need more banks, more banking competition, and more willingness by High Street banks to lend to small and medium sized enterprises and to solvent individuals. The current state of our nationalised banks is holding back recovery. That’s why the government needs to do more than breathe a sigh of relief about a £1 million bonus waived.

For many years I have been urging the case for a new station for Wokingham. I have wanted this new development as we need a better station. The present building lets the town down, and provides a poor entrance for visitors.

I have also wanted changes to the station roundabout junction, and to substitute a bridge or underpass for the present level crossing. For many years I found plenty of support from constituents and the Council, but no positive responses from the railway.

In the heady days of the middle of the last decade I set out proposals for a new station and better roads which could have been paid for from development gain by allowing the construction of some commercial premises on railway land. They could improve the car park with a second level on a smaller part of the plot. Pre 2007 with so much credit and property enthusiasm around it would have been possible. Network Rail did not want to do it.

Now different and more positive management at Network Rail have some proposals for a new station which I welcome. They will be paid for out of the company’s budget for new stations and station improvements. I was told they intend to let the contract for the building works this month, and to complete the station by March 2013. That is great news.

Better still, they wish to follow that with the construction of an underpass under the line near the Station roundabout. Much of Wokingham’s traffic congestion stems from the Station level crossing, assisted by the other two level crossings in the area. If we can have a new way of crossing the railway for large and small vehicles that does not shut down every time a train arrives or departs, the congestion will greatly eased . Safety will also be much improved.

The bridge under the railway on the Finchampstead Road is our only current route which is continuously open, but that cannot take very high vehicles. Other commercial vehicles need to use of the middle of the road, restricting the flows for other traffic.

At last there seems to be some momentum in the plans to improve our town. A new station and new road layout should give a welcome boost. Roll on the Town Centre improvement plans to take the modernisation further.

It is true that the government’s plans to borrow £451 billion over five years were increased to £485 billion in March and are likely to go above the £500 billion level in this revision. I find it difficult to understand the arguments of those who say we are not borrowing enough as a nation. The extra borrowing by this government in just five years will be more than the total national debt built up over 1000 years as recently as 2004. It’s another £8000 on the national credit card for every man, woman and child in the country. All that debt means paying more tax to pay the interest. One day it has to be repaid.

What we need is a strong private sector recovery. The government can organise projects for new power stations, extra reservoirs for water, better broadband, more transport capacity which the private sector can finance. That will help. In Wokingham a sensibly phased and affordable town centre redevelopment can assist. It will first provide construction jobs, and later more retail and service jobs to cater for local demands. I hope this Christmas many residents will find time to stop and shop at local stores. There is already a good range.

The Euro zone crisis is going to hit our export markets on the continent. There have been many warning signs. It means exporters have to spend more of their efforts looking for sales in the faster growing parts of the world, like Asia and Latin America, where the opportunities are much greater. People say around 3 million UK jobs are dependent on exports to the EU. The good news is that means 25 million jobs are not. I wish firms well in finding alternative outlets for products where they find the Euro crisis is hitting demand.

I have been part of the pressure group of MPs urging the Prime Minister to seek a better deal for the UK now that France and Germany seem keen to press on with greater integration and more Brussels government. We cannot possibly join in. Our relationship has to change, as they build their continental superstate. Now is the time to demand change, as the Euro area states need our agreement to the centralisation they think they need. Some doubt whether they can save their currency, but we should assume they are going to and make clear our need for a different deal if they try to.

Many MPs on the Conservative side say we want a renegotiation now. What better time could there be, than when the constitutional arrangements of the EU are up in the air as members try to find a way out of the Euro crisis? We want the people to have a right to a referendum following any such negotiation, so the public can decide if the new terms make it worthwhile staying in, or if it would better to leave. We do not wish to see a single penny of UK taxpayers money wasted on trying to prop up the failing Euro scheme. That’s why I voted against more money for the IMF for fear it would be used to try to prop up the unsupportable on the continent. We are warning the government that soon Euroland will meet regularly, and has the voting power to decide what the whole EU should so. If Euro area countries vote as a bloc the UK will have no influence, no ability to stop undesirable legislation.

The government has made two welcome improvements to our democratic processes which made the referendum debate possible. They have allowed people to petition the No 10 website for a debate in Parliament on a topic that matters to them. That was how the debate on the referendum was first mooted. They have allowed us to establish a backbench business committee with days for debate where we can choose the topics. It was one such day that accommodated the referendum.
Soon the Backbench Committee will also be involved in choosing the business for the government time as well, which could help highlight the matters that need most discussion, and facilitate the passage of those that are uncontentious.

I have long thought we need a more powerful Parliament. Government spends around half of all we earn in this country. It has huge powers of patronage. It has also given away many of its rights to legislate and govern to Brussels. Such power needs challenge from elected people who are in touch with the public mood and understand where things are working badly. The Treasury Committee has just produced proposals to limit the unelected power of the Governor of the Bank of England, and for Parliament to play a role in his appointment. It is such creative thinking we need to try to harness the commonsense of the British people in how we are governed. The mess that the experts and Ministers made in recent years of financial regulation and banking excess, the boom bust cycle they presided over and the growing incursions into our freedoms should all make us want more scrutiny and more transparency. Speaking truth to power is what MPs are meant to do. There are some signs that we are beginning to do just that.

In an attempt to make politics closer to people this government launched two excellent innovations. It allowed backbench MPs to choose the business on certain Parliamentary days. This allows us to discuss the things that government and Opposition may have missed or do not wish to talk about. It allowed members of the public to petition to have a topic debated. If more than 100,000 want a given subject the government hoped the Backbench Business Committee would oblige by allowing it to be debated on one of our days.

It was not long before well over 100,000 people had signed up for a debate on an EU referendum on one petition or another. David Nuttall MP duly put the idea to the Backbench business committee that a debate should be held to propose a people’s referendum. Many Conservative MPs were enthusiastic. The debate was granted. Then the leaderships of the three big parties decided they could not tolerate so much democracy after all. Out came the heavy handed three line whips.

Labour’s use of it was at least consistent with their refusal to hold a referendum when in office. It was nonetheless surprising to see the main Opposition party come to the aid of the Prime Minister and Coalition government, who could have been defeated if Labour had all voted with Conservative proponents of a referendum. On this occasion Labour declined to do the popular thing.

The Lib Dems did yet another of their legendary U turns. They offered an In/Out referendum on the EU as their proposal when the Treaty of Lisbon was going through. This week, when they had the opportunity to vote for such a referendum – with a third option added in- they did not take their chance to do as they promised. Nor did they seek to amend the motion, as they could have done, to bring it exactly into line with their pledge. Instead, they tore up their pledge. They opposed all referenda.

The Conservative Leadership had offered a referendum on the Lisbon treaty before it was brought in. Conservative MPs voted for such a referendum on a three line whip to vote for it in the last Parliament. We were defeated by Lib Dem and Labour MPs outvoting us. The Conservatives fought the last election on a Manifesto which did not offer a referendum, but did offer renegotiation to get powers back from the EU. The backbench motion covered just this option by inviting people to vote on renegotiation as well as on In/Out. Despite this, the leadership decided that did not want to trust the people on this occasion on this issue.

I have received many emails and messages asking me to vote for the motion, which I duly did. I do want Parliament to listen more to the public view. There is great unease about the extent to which our laws are made in Brussels, often without our consent, and the way we are being dragged into the Euro crisis. If you want to know more about how that is all panning out, take a look at www.johnredwood.com where I try to keep you informed. Some day the public do have to be asked for their view. The EU today is a very different body from the EEC which older voters approved in 1975.

I am trying to get some more  life injected into the local economy by proposing more banks with more money to lend for good business prospects. The government is changing its mind on this, and has now announced the outlines of a scheme to help finance small and medium sized enterprises. It is not quite as I recommended, but it offers the opportunity to get something  that might work. They are listening when we tell them there is a serious problem in financing growth.   I put my banking ideas to a meeting in Manchester, where they received good support from the Telegraph the following day. I also launched a new book on the “Future of Conservatism” with David Davis. 16 MPs, one peer and 9 experts have come together to propose ways in which the government could improve our economy, society and public services. This gives us an agenda to pursue with Ministers now we are at last back in Parliament.

I know many of you remain worried about the government’s planning proposals. I have told the Minister of concerns, and been assured our Council will be able to protect areas from development in the local plan. I will work with the Council when we see the next  draft of the new planning rules. It is important that in an area like Wokingham which has accommodated lots of development in the past and where the Council has identified new areas for building we should be able to protect the rest effectively. It is also most important that where new housing is approved proper provision is made for schools, surgeries and transport with suitable developer contributions to the cost.

Energy bills are too high and rising too quickly. I have been pressing the government for some time to pursue an energy policy which will leave us enough affordable energy, whilst offering incentives for fuel saving, better insulation and more efficient appliances and vehicles. Ministers do at last seem worried by the high prices that have been unleashed, and are talking about doing more to help. I will keep the pressure up, as the fuel bill is now one of the biggest worries.

It was pleasant last week to be recognised favourably in Peter Oborne’s book on the guilty men who tried to take the UK into the Euro. He praised the few of us who made the long argument against Euro membership, and forecast that it would lead to a debt and economic crisis. It was always the case that if you want to share a currency with another country, you need to share a government with them. I used to make speeches explaining that joining a single currency meant taking out a bank account with the neighbours. All would be well until you fell out over how big the overdraft should be and who got to spend the money. We are now in the midst of a full blown Euro family row about that overdraft. Should the German savers have to send money to Greece to pay the bills? Should the Greek be able to use German credit worthiness to borrow more? It’s a tragedy for all of us that the EU didn’t work out these elementary issues at the start, before they locked themselves into such a scheme.

The aim of my speeches, interviews and website commentary is now to keep the UK out of having to pay the bills for the mess they are creating. The UK was right to stay out. I see no reason why we should have to pay to help clear up the mess. We may find Euroland can import less from us in the years ahead, owing to the damage the crisis is doing, but that’s no reason for us to try to bail them out, or to lose a fortune on loans that go wrong. There is talk now of a mega package of new loans to keep the overborrowed countries and the weak banks afloat. It’s not more borrowing they need. They need a work out, spending less or bringing in more income. You do not get out of a debt crisis by finding new lenders to offer you more debt.

There has been a lot of interest in www.johnredwod.com, recently voted best MP website. It’s my main way of telling you what I am thinking and doing to represent you in Parliament. Most of the contributors want us to spend less on the EU and be governed less by it. If Euroland is serious about wanting to create a single economic government for the area, the UK can be no part of that. We need a new relationship that makes sense for us, based on trade and friendship, not on a united government of the EU.

I have been preoccupied by the difficulties local and businesses here and around the country have in raising money for their development. The banks tell us they are open to lend, but it does not feel like that for many smaller and medium sized enterprises. It is also a lot more difficult for someone to find a mortgage as a first time buyer, than in the heady days of too much credit prior to the Crash.

I have put proposals to the government about how they might respond to the Vickers Inquiry into the banks. I would like to see them create new banks that could compete on the High Street for personal and business customers, offering better service at lower rates and prices. They could do this out of the assets and liabilities they own from past nationalisations and share purchases, and could float these new banks off, raising more money for them to lend from the markets at the same time. It would give a welcome and much needed boost to our slowing economy.

I have also worked with Parliamentary colleagues to try to get the government to see that the UK needs a different relationship with the EU, now seventeen countries are embarking on much closer union to try to salvage the damaged Euro scheme. They need to control budgets, taxes and spending to reassure markets that the Euro area as a whole is well run. The UK does not want decisions about tax, spending and borrowing taken in Brussels. We need to opt out, but we also need to get some power back, given just how much of our government has been subcontracted to Brussels by recent Treaties.

Some of you have written to me about the planning policy changes. I have had a further meeting with the Planning Minister, who assures me that if Wokingham wishes to protect green areas from development it can now do so by putting these clearly into its local Plan. I urge the Council to take advantage. The new policy abolishes top down regional housebuilding targets, so the Council can decide based on local circumstances what is the right level of development.

I was most concerned to read this. I contacted Greg Clarke, the planning Minister, to explain that in Wokingham we do not want  to be forced into building on protected areas that we value. He reassured me that is not the intention.

Currently some land has Green belt status. This will remain a national designation, and the future  protection of it will continue as before. Some land is designated as  a Site of Special Scientific Interest. SSSIs will remain as before, with special protection.

Some of the important green gaps between settlements, high grade agricultural land  and leisure space is not protected by one of these national legal frameworks. This is where the government’s new policy of localism comes in. The Council can designate land as important to remain without development for a variety of good reasons. This may  include green gaps between settlements, agricultural and landscape value, leisure use, and absence of suitable transport and other services to enable the construction of sustainable communities. Once land is specified with protection in the local plan, that will inform and direct Planning Inspectors to turn down applications should anyone wish to test out the opportunity for developing it.

The government is changing the presumption for other land. If land is not specially designated with a national protection or in the local plan as being permanent green space, then there will be a presumption in favour of sustainable development. This makes the contents of the local plan even more
important. The Council needs to make sure it has protected the important green spaces that have most popular support, as the complement to its policy of concentrating development in its own preferred locations.

I am sure people in Wokingham will want continuing protection – preferably better protection – for important areas free from development, as some offset for development in the designated sites. I will support the Council on appeal where it has designated land for protection, should need arise.

Many of you will join with me in thanking local police officers who went to help neighbouring forces in difficult conditions. The police took a battering in order to re establish control of our streets. The cancellation of leave was a necessary sacrifice they made to do the job.

I have written extensively on johnredwood.com all last week about the problems, and have been inundated with responses. Most agree that the first priority was for the police to get in control by a strong physical presence and by actively arresting those who are looting or in other ways threatening people and property. We cannot create jobs, offer good public facilities and meet people’s aspirations, if warehouses are torched and shops ransacked. We need to do everything we can to attract investment, new business and enterprise to our cities. The easiest way of turning it all off is to wield the petrol bomb and the pick axe. The second priority is to ensure proper penalties are imposed on those who were guilty of crime.

In the aftermath of last week’s violence we need to consider what else we need to do, apart from the more muscular policing. There should be no reward for rioting. There should be sensible soul searching about our society, and how we can improve it. It emphasises the importance of the government’s welfare reforms. It always needs to be more rewarding to work than to stay on benefits. Parents need to take a strong interest in the wellbeing and discipline of their children. Schools everywhere have to offer a framework of quiet authority that allows ambition and talent to flourish, and more to feel they can achieve through conventional means.

Drugs, excessive alcohol, and gang culture all need more attention and will I trust now receive it. There are things government can and should do. There are also things the rest of us can do, as we all need to contribute to the creation of a responsible society where each of us strives to avoid harming others. Many of you can offer some leadership to the groups and people you are close to.

I will be working with Ministers to see early implementation of welfare reforms and to strengthen an economic policy capable of generating many more jobs. Wokingham shows how many can provide service and effort that helps the whole community. We need to spread the successful ways of bringing up children, avoiding or removing drugs, and offering hope of a better tomorrow into all parts of our country. In the meantime we need to make it clear that criminals will be detected and prosecuted.