Southampton Lib Dems defect to the Liberals

Below is the press release following the defection of 3 Lib Dem cllr's to The Liberal Party in Southampton in 2002

Southampton Councillors Join Liberal Party
We as serving Liberal Democrat Councillors on Southampton City Council have now left the Liberal Democrats to join The Official Liberal Party.
We urge Liberals across Hampshire to consider the actual policies that the Lib Dem's are now committed to and how the continuing Liberal Party represents the best traditions of British Liberalism.
The Lib Dem's are Euro-fanatics who support a centralised Super State of Europe, they support the Euro currency despite the fact that Britain would loose any democratic control of our tax and expenditure policies.
In the case of Regional Government The Liberal Party opposes an Assembly for the whole of the South East with only 25-35 members, elected by the Party List system.
That would mean the whole of Hampshire would be lucky to have one representative.
Even worse the assembly would have no power over areas such as policing, education and skills, health nor other public utilities.
We need real devolution to real people not this sham proposals by Prescott which would lead to Counties like Hampshire being abolished.
We urge other real Liberals to rejoin The Liberal Party as we have done.
Cllrs George Melrose, Cllr Mike Gausden,Cllr Harry Mitchell
Southampton Official Liberal Party Group