Who are the Copeland by-election candidates?

Name: Michael Guest

Party: Independent

Age: 72

Born: Epsom, Surrey

Lives: Prospect (Kells), Whitehaven

Job: Retired ex-military

Family: Married with four children, two grand daughters and two great-grand sons.

Why are you standing? I understand local community needs combined with a knowledge of local and national politics. National political parties are fundamentally flawed and undemocratic due to their ‘whip system’, candidate selection and promotion of career politicians, it clearly facilitates self-interest. It is people and the communities they live in which are important, not national political ideology.

What is the main issue facing Copeland? We live in a beautiful borough and with nuclear on our doorstep our area should be flourishing. Walking around the many wards and streets we do not see any proportional financial investment. My eight pledges of increasing wealth and prosperity through diversification of industry within our towns and economy will aim to sustain this. Copeland’s infrastructure is poor which faces us with many obstacles in order to attract new industry and services. The NHS is on its knees and I believe this is down to two parties squabbling to the detriment of people’s lives.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: I am a fair and calm person and above all I listen to reason. WORST: Liking for sausage rolls and vanilla sponge.

Name: Rebecca Hanson

Party: Liberal Democrats

Age: 44

Born: Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Lives: Cockermouth

Job: Education adviser, running training for primary teachers through my own business – Authentic Maths.

Family: Husband and five children between us.

When did you join your party and why? 2011. As a lecturer in education I’d been contributing to consultations on National Education Policy. When Michael Gove shut down all professional consultation, I joined the only party that could challenge him.

What is the main issue facing Copeland? The NHS. But the many aspects of nuclear, education, Brexit, flooding and the social divide are also massive.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: A capacity to work with and support people from all backgrounds. WORST: West Cumbria is my home. I’m interested in making our services better, so I can be a bit blunt when I see local issues not being addressed!

Name: Trudy Harrison

Party: Conservative Party

Age: 40

Born: West Cumberland Hospital, Whitehaven

Lives: Bootle, west Cumbria

Job: Project manager, Bootle2020

Family: Husband Keith is a welder in the nuclear industry, and four daughters all born at West Cumberland Hospital.

When did you join your party and why? I joined the Conservative Party last year, after watching the prime minister give her speech at the Conservative Party Conference. But I’ve been involved in local politics for over 10 years after my local school, Captain Shaw’s in Bootle, was scheduled to close. Thankfully, I’m happy to say that we were successful in stopping the closure, and Captain Shaw’s is now the fastest growing school in Cumbria.

What is the main issue facing Copeland? I think there are a number of big issues facing Copeland, and sadly they haven’t changed over the last 10 years. That’s why I have launched my six-point plan to finally tackle those problems, issues like investing in local roads, protecting vital services like the NHS, giving young people the best chance in life, and protecting our nuclear industry. Of course, it is also essential we make a success of Brexit.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: My best quality is the experience I have of getting stuff done for my community. Once I have set my mind to something I give everything I’ve got to make a success of it, whether that is saving Captain Shaw’s school or securing private sector funding for the renovation of my village.

Name: Roy Ivinson

Party: Independent

Age: 62

Lives: Silloth

Job: Farmer

What is the main issue facing Copeland? A dysfunctional economy.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: The ability to politically analyse facts. WORST: I have very little aptitude for wanting to understand technology.

Name: Jack Lenox

Party: Green Party

Age: 29

Born: Maldon, Essex

Lives: Keswick

Job: Software engineer

Family: Live with my girlfriend. We’ve been together for 12 years.

When did you join your party and why? I joined at the start of 2015, several months before the General Election. I joined because I had become totally disillusioned with the actions of all the other parties. I grew up during the Blair years and became increasingly interested in politics during the time that the revelations relating to the invasion of Iraq were becoming public. I didn’t find the Labour party remotely inspiring by 2010. I had what turned out to be misplaced optimism for the coalition of the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. I read Caroline Lucas’s book Honourable Friends, which was a real eye-opener about the sorry state of politics and democracy in the UK.

What is the main issue facing Copeland? I think the core problem is the single industry economy. We are almost entirely dependent on the nuclear industry, and it puts us at a distinct disadvantage as we seem to have to just accept whatever we’re offered.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: I’m open and honest, which can sometimes also be bad! WORST: I’m quite impulsive, which can sometimes also be good.

Name: Fiona Mills

Party: Ukip

Age: 47

Born: I was born in Africa as my parents were working there at the time. We moved to Cumbria when I was four, lived on St Helena for three years from age seven and then settled in Carlisle when I was 10. I’ve lived most of my life here and love Cumbria.

Lives: I’m currently renting in Carlisle. If I become Copeland’s MP I will of course move into the constituency and will enjoy being closer to the countryside (I’m an avid fell walker).

Job: Qualified accountant at North Cumbria University Hospitals NHS Trust. I have actually worked for the NHS for 24 years, 16 in Cumbria and I lived away for eight years to gain experience in Barnsley and Chester.

Family: My dad lives in Carlisle and I have two brothers; one lives in Allerdale the other in Singapore.

When did you join your party and why? I joined UKIP in February 2014 because I believe in freedom and democracy. Our sovereignty as a nation state is being compromised by the EU and we are getting a raw deal. The establishment parties are unrepresentative of the people and have made huge errors of judgement – I’ve seen this all the time working in the NHS. I can’t change it from the inside so I decided to try and change it from the outside. I also love the fact that we have no party whips and can properly represent people’s wishes.

What is the main issue facing Copeland? There are many issues facing Copeland; jobs, infrastructure, education, but the one worrying most is health services. The crises the NHS faces are a direct result of mismanagement by Labour and Conservatives over the last two decades. They didn’t train enough doctors and nurses so we have difficulty providing safe services. This is the main reason for the possible downgrading of maternity services. There is also limited funding available for clinical services because of Labour’s disastrous PFI policy – buy one hospital, pay for six. Ukip health policy has the solutions; more doctors, less bureaucracy, more funding.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: My best quality is my honesty. WORST: My worst quality is my impatience.

Name: Gillian Troughton

Party: The Labour Party

Age: 52

Born: Middleton, Lancashire

Lives: Moresby Park

Job: Volunteer for the St John Ambulance, and local councillor

Family: Husband who works in the nuclear supply chain, two grown-up children

When did you join your party and why? I have always believed in fairness and equality and I’m passionate about Labour’s greatest creation, the NHS. I joined the party in 2010 because I believe only Labour can deliver well-funded public services that everyone can access. If I am voted in as MP for Copeland I will fight for our local NHS.

What is the main issue facing Copeland? We need to protect our local NHS services. We need to stop the Tories scrapping our A&E, downgrading maternity services and ditching our children’s ward at West Cumberland Hospital. We need to protect the inpatient beds at Keswick and put a stop to the Tories’ merciless NHS cuts. I’m campaigning to protect these vital services. I’ve driven the road up to Carlisle on blue lights as an ambulance driver, it isn’t sustainable. As a former hospital doctor, I know that the NHS is being let down by the Tories. To them, it’s about costs and not care. I will do everything I can to keep our hospital services here.

What would you describe as your best quality – and your worst? BEST: I’ve always been able to take on board other people’s views which I believe is something that helps in politics and gets things done locally. WORST: Probably speaking my mind a little bit too much.