Conservative East Worthing and Shoreham candidate on her priorities

Leila Williams was launched into the contest as the party’s candidate for East Worthing and Shoreham after MP Tim Loughton stood down.

Since her selection on June 1, Ms Williams, who was born and grew up in Brighton and later lived in Shoreham and Southwick, has been out campaigning every day to win over voters in the seat, which has been held by the Tories since 1997.

“I don’t think I’ve ever worked 28 days without a day off before,” she said.

“It’s like the Apprentice. Every day is a new task and whether you’re good at it or not you just have to get on with it.

“I feel like I’ve learned so much in the last month.

“I’m really enjoying it and in fact I feel like I’m just getting into the swing of things.

“I feel like I could do another month.”

The 40-year-old currently works as the deputy divisional director of operations for University Sussex Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

She has worked in Worthing for ten years and the NHS for 15.

The mother of two, who previously served the community on Adur District Council as the councillor for Hillside, wants to use her experience to help improve access to care for residents.

“Dentistry is a real issue,” she said.

“There are no NHS dentists in the constituency accepting adults and one accepting children.

“That’s something I’ve faced trying to get my own son registered.

“I’m think it’s an issue that most dentists can choose to work privately so it’s probably about incentivising them financially to provide that care.

“They will then say well there’s no funding, well there may not be but when you look at the knock-on effect, I see this every day in my work, if you don’t see them at an early stage you see them in A&E a few days or weeks later  and it’s so much worse and the cost of the system comes from a different pot but it’s still there.”

Ms Williams says she would like to see the NHS system made more efficient.

“One thing I’m passionate about is looking at the whole system holistically,” she said.

“At the moment we don’t do things that are right for the patient because it doesn’t save the right pot of money.

“There are too many people in A&E with things they don’t need to be seen in A&E for.

“That has a knock-on effect on ambulance handover times.

“The same for social care.

“Part of the reason ambulances wait so long to hand over is because the patients they’re bringing in can’t get a bed.

“They can’t get a bed because people aren’t getting out of beds because there are no social care beds.

“I’ve seen all this first hand and I know how frustrated my clinicians are and how we as managers are.

“I suppose that frustration has driven me to the point of thinking well if I can’t influence this on the inside of the NHS can I come at it from a policy level?

“Clearly, we can’t carry on with the standard we’re achieving. We have to improve.

“It’s not just a question of money, yes money would help in certain areas but it’s not just money, it’s the wastage caused by that inefficiency of process.”

Ms Williams also feels strongly about girls' and women’s rights, single sex spaces and single sex sports and the plight of the 6,500 Waspi (Women Against State Pension Inequality) women in the constituency who are still waiting for compensation.

The women say they were not given enough warning that the state pension age was going up from 60 to 66.

Another priority of Ms Williams is housing, particularly as she has experienced first hand the state of the rental sector.

Ms Williams is hoping to hold the seat following the departure of Tim Loughton (Image: The Argus)

“I haven’t been able to get on the property ladder so I’m still renting,” she said.

“I’ve had two no fault evictions in the last six years so that’s been tough.

“I really want us to have more long-term, secure housing for people whether they’re able to rent or buy. Otherwise you can be asked to leave at two months’ notice and you have to start all over again.

“The cost of rental is really shocking now.

“There are a lot of initiatives that we could do more on.

“Social housing has a negative connotation, I think it’s more co-operatively owned, or a system of lending where people can actually borrow the deposits they need from a group.

“There must be more that we can do.”

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She also supports the creation of the Arundel bypass.

“Just because we’re trying to find a traffic solution doesn’t mean we’re not trying to find active travel solutions,” she said.

“I’ve done a lot of canvassing in north Lancing and the congestion and pollution there is making life a misery.”

And on sewage? A major issue in East Worthing and Shoreham, Ms Williams said there is more to be done.

“We’ve seen the monitoring of this sewage problem increase massively," she said.

"Partly the reason it didn’t seem as bad under the Labour government 14 years ago was because we didn’t have adequate monitoring. Water companies were left to self-assess themselves.

“This isn’t a new problem, growing up in Brighton the sea was terrible in the 90s.

“I don’t know anyone who swam in the sea when I was young.

“We have come some way in improving it but we must go further.”

Asked how she felt about her party amid scandals and declining popularity Ms Williams said she is a “proud” Conservative but acknowledged and condemned recent behaviour.

“I’m proud of the success this government has had,” she said.

“Getting us through the pandemic with a welfare support injection, the likes of which we’ve never seen before.

“We got the vaccine a year earlier that we would have done had we been in Europe.

“I do feel, like most people, angry about recent things, such as the betting scandal which is just appalling.

“I cannot understand anyone prioritising the making of a few hundred quid over their integrity.

“And further back than that we’ve had party gate.

“We’ve had a number of scandals. It has eroded people’s trust.

“I’ve seen those things and I want to be part of a new generation of Tory MPs coming through that have learned from this.

“I want to make things better.

“I think we need a more diverse parliament, we need more women, more working parents, more  people from ethnic backgrounds.

“I’ve claimed benefits before, I’ve lived off virtually no money, been a single mother, I know what it’s like working three part-time jobs to try and fit around school runs.

“We need more people who understand what it’s like for working families.

“I would like to see us become a much more electable party among my age group and the younger age group.

“I know we have a lot of work to do to get back to that.

“The behaviour of certain individuals, particularly in recent months and years has not been acceptable.

“I can only promise I will do better.”