As 2012 draws to a close, it is good to reflect on the year that has been.

Over the summer, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and the spectacular London Olympic and Paralympics gave us a great cause to celebrate and showcased Britain in a wonderful way on the world stage.

Yet in this year of triumph, we also faced a number of challenges for our Party.

We are now half way through this Parliament and there are difficult decisions which still need to be made to keep our economy on track, but I think as Conservatives we recognise that time and time again, it falls to us to deal with the deficit, cut out waste and clean up the mess left by previous socialist governments (a process which can take years), no matter what the short-term fallout such difficult decisions can mean for us.

Of course, this is not helped by the eurozone crisis, but we are already seeing real results. The deficit has been cut by a quarter (£13 billion) in just two years

Almost 500,000 more people are in work than this time last year, and over one million new jobs have been created in the private sector since we came to office.

There has also been great progress in the areas of health, employment, education, welfare and taxation reform and much more and I will continue to work hard on all of these issues together with my Government colleagues next year.

Here in South Cambridgeshire, we have had terrific results in both the Council and Police and Crime Commissioner elections, where it was tremendous to see our councillors returned to office and Sir Graham Bright victorious in his campaign to be elected as our new PCC.

It has also been pleasing to see excellent local developments with good progress being made in terms of Northstowe, the rollout of superfast broadband across rural areas, improvements to the A14, upgrades to the eastern region rail network and the announcement of new schools and academies in our area.

Finally, in the spirit of this Christmas period, it seems appropriate to be thankful for the wonderful and charitable community spirit we have in South Cambridgeshire.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish each of you a peaceful and happy Christmas and a New Year.

You can contact Andrew at his constituency office

      Andrew Lansley CBE MP
      153 St Neots Road
      Hardwick
      Cambridge
      CB23 7QJ

            T  01954 212 707
            E  lansleya@parliament.uk
            W  Andrew Lansley 
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