Can broken Thanet be fixed by KCC with Margate unemployment now at 12%

Roger Gale can't fix it. Margate has burned down.

Steve Ladyman can't fix it. Ramsgate has fallen down and the ferry don't fit. Except for the County and Gerneral elections.

Laura Sandys can't fix it. Silence. Roger speaks for her and their foolish 2012 airport policy that won't do it. As that will be in 2012. For a month.

Thanet has been sacrificed to their Westminster and Party careers.

Thanet councillors can't fix it. Moving up the improving rankings from "useless" to "abysmal" is seen as a victory.

The Gang of Four can't fix it. They can't even paint the bandstands in the centre of town. Years go by and things get worse. No-one ever got fired for failure at TDC.

The Environment Agency can't fix it: tonnes of pollutants in the water and a Planning regime of failure and idleness that allows Thor mercury to continue polluting for 20 years.

SEEDA hasn't fixed it. Research prosposals highlighting there is a problem that needs a problem-solving solution won't do it.

KCC hasn't fixed it. Decades of failure. And now 12% unemployment in Margate.

12% unemployment.

Across the whole of the USA credit-crunched from bank speculation unemployment is at 8%. In the UK it's at 3%.

12% in Margate.

For the first time in decades KCC is faced with the wholesale failure of an area on a par with Chatham Dockyard.

Can KCC rise to the challenge.

They're off the map here though.

2 bed flats won't do it.

Another motorway won't do it.

A cargo airport opposite Ostend cargo airport won't do it.

More zebra-crossings in Tunbridge Wells won't do it.

A Town Council and District Council structure won't do it.

Party politics won't do it. The Conservatives are in power in TDC and County Hall and it's failure. Just as when Labour was in power.

How will the County authority be able to regenerate decimated Thanet?

Thames Gateway is stalled and Dreamland a burned-out husk.

Next week a series of articles on regeneration for Thanet.

As MP I will call for Parliamentary scrutiny of every deprived region in Kent - every quarter.

Since when was 1930's levels of deprivation acceptrable in Kent or the UK. Not even in the 1930's.

The problem with party politics is the parties themselkves: see Policy #6 electoral reform. Failing to invest. Investing in their own boroughs. And investing in foolish white elephant schemes.

Failed. Failed. Failed.

12% unemployment.

Failed.

The electoral reform structures will create a New Kent.

Not the failed generation battles of Thatcherism and Foot.

Not the economic policies of Backyard London and Concrete Kent.

A Garden of England for the 21st Century.

Time for Change.