With campaigning for the General Election under way in the Chippenham constituency we meet the Labour candidate.

A UNION man born and bred, Andy Newman wants the Labour Party to return to its position of main rival to the Tories in most areas of Wiltshire.

The Labour candidate for Chippenham believes the socio-economic mix of people living in towns such as Melksham, Corsham and Chippenham is no different to areas of Swindon where his party does well.

Mr Newman, 53, who last year married a fellow union activist Carole Vallelly and moved to her home town of Corsham, believes the groundwork being done by Labour for the General Election will pay off in the Wiltshire Council elections in 2017.

He said: “The Labour Party should be the main opposition party here rather than the Lib Dems. I am confident we can get back to that position and have a good showing at the local elections.

“I have had a very positive response from people in Corsham where for a long time Christine Reid was a strong and well-liked Labour councillor.

“A lot of people here have been very glad to see a Labour person standing on their doorstep. We are doing the groundwork now ready for the local elections and putting systems in place that will help us to get back to where we belong.”

Mr Newman, who has two sons, Oscar, 14, and Aaron, 10, has pinned his colours to the controversial application by The Range to build a distribution depot in Chippenham.

He said: “I wanted to find out if the jobs that were going to be created were going to be proper contracts or zero-hours, temporary contracts. If they had been zero-hours contracts I would have been against the plan.

“But I was assured that there will be 700 jobs with proper 40-hour contracts at £7 an hour. There is also likely to be up to 200 temporary jobs at busy times of year.

"I see this as a fantastic opportunity to get jobs for Chippenham and to stop it becoming a dormitory town where everyone commutes to other areas for jobs.”

He said the issue of precarious employment for people without proper contracts was one of the big issues for the town.

He also wants to help get a better deal for dairy farmers over milk prices and to make voluntary agreements between the National Farmers Union and Milk UK compulsory.

His third major concern is over affordable housing and he is against David Cameron’s right-to-buy manifesto pledge as he believes this will make it harder for low income people to get decent housing. Mr Newman, who grew up in the Somerset village of Saltford and is branch secretary of the Wiltshire and Swindon branch of the GMB union.

FACT FILE

Age: 53

Address: Elm Hayes, Corsham

Occupation: Systems engineer and branch secretary of the GMB union

Marital status: Married

Children: Oscar, 14, Aaron, ten

Standing in Chippenham are:

Michelle Donelan (Conservative);

Duncan Hames (Liberal Democrat);

Tina Johnson (Green);

Andy Newman (Labour);

Julia Reid (UKIP)