AS THE warmth of summer grows closer, our market towns seem to be coming back to life more and more with each passing day. Bridport for example, where I visited last Saturday, put on the first live music performance at Bucky Doo Square for months and proved well and truly that West Dorset is back open for business.

I visited the Loders and Uploders scarecrow festival on Saturday afternoon and stopped off at the Spyway Inn, Askerswell for lunch. It was great to see hospitality businesses in West Dorset such as the Spyway rise to the challenge of Covid with innovations such as their ‘Spypods’. Kudos to landlords Mark and Laura for their hard work. The food was great so do go and visit.

Last week, I heard the church bells of Westminster Abbey ring from my office. As a bellringer myself, I always love the wonderful sound of bells. The Tower Captain of Sherborne Abbey tells me they’ve started ringing again last Sunday as are many other churches. If you ring too and are ever in need of a bell ringer, I’m always happy to help!

Our parish churches should be reopening now. I know many feel coronavirus has driven a distance between them and church life. To do my bit to help, I was elected Churchwarden at Bishops Caundle on Monday and will do all I can to support parish churches in West Dorset fully recover.

People could see food miles on food labels if my amendment to the Environment Bill is successful. I put forward this amendment last week to allow consumers to make food choices that align with their environmental values. This would allow us as environmentally conscious consumers to more easily decide between an avocado flown in from thousands of miles away and British meat or veg produced round the corner, literally here in West Dorset.

CHRIS LODER

West Dorset MP