Marcus paid tribute to Paddy Ashdown today at a memorial service in St Johns Church, Yeovil.

Since my last column in this paper we have had another set of elections, the Prime Minister has resigned and Somerset have won the One-Day Cup Final at Lords by six wickets.

On Monday I was a guest of the BBC at a screening of a new Panorama programme about social care, airing next week, in which the story of care in Somerset is centre stage.

This springtime a key part of my focus is on education and skills training having recently been elected Vice Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Education, and I feel very positive about the opportunities that we can build on in Somerset.

Easter is a lovely time of year and I very much hope that people got to have a break, maybe spend time with their families and certainly enjoyed a pause from what had become a rather repetitive national news cycle.

This week MPs are on a shortened Easter recess. Even this has divided opinion in these challenging political times but for many of us it is the first proper chance to spend time with family and catch up on work in our constituencies since Christmas.

Last week I was pleased to be elected a Vice Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Education. There are APPGs for many issues in Parliament and I am involved with some including the ones on Knifecrime and Equitable Life.

It’s been another week to test the constitutional experts in Westminster and MPs have been consulting their copies of Erskine May trying to keep up.

At the time of writing we are coming up to another vote on the Withdrawal Agreement on the EU on Tuesday evening.

On Monday, Communities Secretary James Brokenshire made a very positive statement in the House of Commons about the new Stronger Towns Fund which will sit alongside other revenue streams such as the Shared Prosperity Fund and Future High Streets fund as ways to help our cities, towns and villages