IN THE House of Commons earlier this month, The Chancellor of the Exchequer laid out her Spending Review, and the plans for all of government spending over the next year, and in some cases beyond.

As the government set out their priorities, unfortunately it was clear that the South West did not feature in them.

The government now seems to understand that the South West doesn’t start and end with Bristol, but their revised map of the South West only includes Bristol and Swindon. No further mentions of South West England, no mentions of Devon, and no mentions of Somerset, were made in either the text of the Spending Review, or the statement and answers which accompanied it, I know that my constituents deserve the attention of government, and I am determined to make government give them that attention..

Rachel Reeves did choose to focus on deprivation in her speech. This is a topic close to my heart, and to my constituents. The government has announced additional funding to support up to 350 new communities — although we don’t know how much the communities will stand to get, nor the full list of where they are. Most of them are in the North, or around Labour’s so-called ‘Red Wall’, and the closest to Tiverton and Minehead that the list gets is Swindon.

I have written to the Chancellor to ask her to explain more about this pot of money, but it seems we will be waiting for the Deputy Prime Minister to make the big announcement. We don’t even know what set of data the government will be using to determine the direction of this fund yet.

The West Somerset Opportunity Area, to me, seems like the perfect example of where some of this funding could and should be directed. Backed up by numbers from the Office of National Statistics, we know that the region was ranked 324 out of 324 for social mobility, and everyone who lives here knows that community assets are stretched, and often just not up to scratch. The fund, according to the government, could be used to improve parks, youth facilities, and libraries, as well as fighting back against graffiti and fly-tipping to counter anti-social behaviour.

There is one use of the fund that I think West Somerset could benefit from most of all – swimming pools. It is one of the stated uses of this fund, according to the Chancellor, and it could make a real difference to people in West Somerset.

I hope that the government’s attention does turn to West Somerset soon. I have lived in or near West Somerset for most of my life, and I know that any investment in this area will be repaid ten or twenty-fold with the hard work, dedication and drive of the people who live here. I will keep fighting to make government realise what they could do, if they could only see this fantastic corner of the county for what it is: special, magical and bursting with community spirit.