Chelmsford - By Vicky Ford MP

I recently convened a meeting in Westminster with the Essex County Council Cabinet Member for Infrastructure, County Cllr Lesley Wagland and the Roads Minister Richard Holden MP, to discuss the Army and Navy sustainable transport package. It was a very positive meeting.

Regular readers will know that replacing the Army and Navy junction is one of my top priorities. However projects like this one take a frustratingly long time to deliver and are expensive. Since the flyover was closed and removed for safety reasons, the task force that I set up has met many times. Initial designs and engineering studies were prepared by Essex County Council working with the Department for Transport and looked at many different options. A new flyover was ruled out as this would have created even more congestion and had a very high risk of accidents compared to other options.

to discuss the challenges facing the service and to stress the importance of a reliable bus service for the people of Chelmsford. From January until the end of March, the maximum single fare on any First Bus Essex route has been capped at £2 as part of a £60 million government project to encourage more people to use the buses. I have agreed to meet with him again in early March. If the passenger numbers have increased enough on key routes, then he will look at adding more services to improve the frequency.

I was pleased to be part of what was a huge turnout of Conservative women MPs for a recent debate in Westminster on drink spiking to urge the government minister to make spiking a specific and named offence in law. It was good to be there. Whilst spiking is covered by older legislation related to poisoning, we heard how if it does become a named offence it could make it much easier to collect accurate data and would act as a significant deterrent to perpetrators.