I HAVEN’T wanted to play the local party politics game when it comes to Southampton City Council’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Frankly, I think the residents of our city deserve better from their elected representatives in a time of absolute crisis.

But I must speak out and respond to the repeated lie being peddled by Southampton Conservatives that Southampton City Council never had a shortage of PPE during the early stages of the pandemic.

Cllr Steven Galton is responsible for putting this lie on leaflets across the city and was Chair of the Overview and Security Committee held on 11th June.

He heard evidence that in the first week of April there were only a few days’ supply of face masks left for staff.

At this time there was no assurance from Government as to when the next delivery would arrive.

A public call was made to local businesses asking them to donate PPE and the leader of the council and I wrote a letter to all three Southampton MPs asking them to urgently highlight this problem to Ministers.

Was Cllr Galton not paying attention at the meeting he was chairing?

The shambolic approach to PPE supply, by his Government, has been well documented but Southampton Conservatives would rather cover up problems, and risk lives just to save Boris Johnson’s blushes.

Thank god they are not running the council, at a time when we need trust and integrity in political life.

Local Conservatives continue to scrape the bottom of the barrel for cheap political gain.

Shame on them.

Cllr Lorna Fielker

Cabinet Member for Health and Adult Care Southampton City Council