Opinion: 'Liz Truss recognises the potential that our city has', writes Paul Bristow

For the last few weeks, my vote has been one of 357. My vote for the next Leader of the Conservative Party has now become one of around 200,000.

Ballots will start arriving soon. I’m not going to tell party members in Peterborough, or elsewhere, what to do. But I’m happy to tell every constituent whom I support and why.

I was one of the MPs who nominated Liz Truss in the very first round. I’m delighted that she made it through to the final two. I hope and expect her to go all the way.

Like Boris Johnson, Liz made her very first campaign visit in Peterborough. Like our current Prime Minister, she recognises the potential that our city has and our importance.

As our Prime Minister, I believe that Liz Truss would deliver for us.She was brilliant when she joined me at Little Miracles in Ravensthorpe, while getting some cheeky questions from the children there. Even the political editor of the Guardian admitted she’d handled them well.

And the adults were impressed too. The charity’s chair of governors was quoted saying, “I think she was sincere and was interested in what we are doing and what we had to say today.”

Liz has been refreshingly clear. She has also been brave enough to speak out about the increasingly weird objectives of Stonewall, which used to campaign for gay rights, but has been taken over by an aggressive, ideological agenda on trans issues.

Protecting spaces for women has already been necessary. Now Stonewall is not just trying to change what’s taught in classrooms, but is actively campaigning for two-year-olds to be told they might be in the “wrong” body.For goodness sake. Some two-year-olds have only just started to talk. They need many things, but not this nonsense.

Let kids be kids. They need lots of understanding and lots of love.Stonewall’s claims about sex and gender are just plain wrong and potentially damaging.

Obviously, some difficult issues can be involved. Yet that’s precisely why we shouldn’t allow the casual normalisation of children taking drugs that delay puberty, or allow vulnerable young teenagers to have life-altering surgery before they are ready.

This agenda is causing some of the confusion and pain that it purports to solve.