Meet your candidates: Labour party for Buckingham, David Morgan

The seat has not been properly contested since 2005 due to the tradition of the main parties not putting up candidates against the Speaker of the House, which of course had been Buckingham's own John Bercow since 2009.

Last week, Mr Bercow confirmed he would not be standing again in the upcoming election.

Today, this paper spoke to the Labour candidate for Buckingham, David Morgan.

Mr Morgan has had an extremely varied life before entering this election battle. After gaining a Master's degree in Politics, he initially went into banking before moving into teaching and ending up lecturing in Law and Politics at Warwick, Leicester and Wolverhampton universities. He has also been an assistant to a member of the European Parliament.

Currently he presents a communities radio show in Milton Keynes and is a councillor on the Shenley Brook End and Tattenhoe Parish Council.

Brought up in Birmingham, Mr Morgan, 59, now lives in Milton Keynes and is married with two children.

We asked the Labour candidate for Buckingham why he chose to run in the constituency. He explained:

“I enjoy coming over to Buckingham and one of the privileges of working at the radio station is the Buckingham Literature Festival. We've covered it for the past couple of years - Buckingham is a really nice town.”

On the subject of HS2, which is high on most people's priority list in the region, Mr Morgan said:

“I have no problem with railway lines that will take people off of aeroplanes. Having HS2 coming up from Euston to Birmingham is not going to take anyone off an aeroplane. It'll take a few minutes off some people's journey but the disruption and the destruction that it's causing is just not worth it. There's an awful lot of money being spent on this for very little benefit.”

He continued:

“I think there is a huge amount of gesture politics involved in HS2 and I think we need to see stronger evidence of environmental benefits coming from it.”

Appearing to sense some frustration with previous MPs in Buckinghamshire regarding their reluctance to diverge from the party line, Mr Morgan added with some emphasis:

“No one needs to worry about me toeing the party line. I don't want a ministerial position, I want to represent my constituents.”

Moving on to Brexit, the former politics lecturer was clear that he wants a second referendum. Showing off his pro-Europe wristband, he said:

“I was a strong campaigner for Remain during the referendum. Brexit is such bad news for Britain. To do something that is going to damage our country as badly as leaving the European Union, well there's no upsides to it.”

He added:

“The great thing about the British is that we've always aspired to, and the phrase often comes up, 'punch above our weight' in world circles, and Europe allowed us to do that. We're actually very good at using EU institutions to our benefit.”

Mr Morgan told us that his three main priorities are education, health and the environment. Displaying a passionate concern for the latter in particular, which he wove into much of our conversation, he said:

“I might be lucky and not survive long enough but when I think of my kids and what they're facing, well it's not what I want to leave to them. We're already seeing lives shortened by pollution.”

Away from politics, David Morgan is a keen local historian and lover of jazz music.