The recent flooding has reminded us all how dependable our local firefighters are when we need them most. Faced with the need to make savings while continuing to deliver vital fire and rescue services, Wiltshire and Swindon Fire Authority is considering a merger with Dorset.

I have spoken to the Fire Authority’s chairman about the challenges ahead and written to the minister responsible for fire services about the funds available to them. In the House of Commons last week, I noted it is one of the lower cost fire authorities to council taxpayers and asked him to give the authority the freedom to raise the funds it needs.

Monday, I and other Wiltshire MPs met the chairmen of both fire authorities to learn more about their proposals and how services would be protected.

I have written previously about the concerns raised by the delay in adopting Wiltshire Council’s Core Strategy for development planning in the county. Having already sought assurances that the Government will defend our countryside from speculative development once the plan is finally adopted, I asked the Planning Minister what advice he would give the council now, to bring some order to development control. Most useful would be official guidance to planning inspectors which gives weight to councils’ emerging plans which are close to being formally adopted.

My fellow Liberal Democrats headed to York over the weekend for the party’s spring conference, and I was pleased to see Nick Clegg make a strong, passionate defence of Britain’s liberal, internationalist traditions in his speech. As he said, “Britain doesn’t just peer out at the rest of the world and shrug its shoulders. We are always at our best when we play our part.”

Instead of making the trip to York, though, I was in Wiltshire to hold two constituency surgeries, in Corsham and Bradford on Avon, and to celebrate Corsham’s new Fairtrade Town status with the local campaigners who made it happen.

I was also out knocking on doors and speaking to residents in Bradford on Avon to support the Liberal Democrat candidate Fiona Best in the Town Council by-election last Thursday. As usual it was a nail-bitingly close contest between her and the Conservative candidate.

My constituency surgeries were at The Pound Arts Centre, Corsham on Friday (noon-1.30pm) and at my office in Avonbridge House, Chippenham on Saturday (12.30-2pm).