Conservatives Choose Local Election Candidates For Riverside

New faces chosen to replace two long-time councillors who have retired

The Conservative Party has selected its three candidates to run for election as local councillors for the Riverside ward in the next local elections, due to be held in May 2018.

The candidates are long-serving councillor Sam Hearn, who is seeking re-election, and two lawyers, Michael Denniss, and Fadi Farhat. Councillors Paul Lynch and Felicity Barlow decided to step down from serving as councillors for the Riverside ward after many years in local politics.

Michael Denniss (above) grew up in Grove Park, where he still lives. Michael is a solicitor currently working for the Government Equalities Office. He has a wide range of experience working in the public, private and charity sectors. In his spare time he volunteers as the treasurer of a local charity for the homeless.
He is a keen to continue being a champion for social responsibility in the ward and the Borough. He is particularly concerned with the plight of homeless people. If elected he intends to tackle homelessness and its causes across the Borough. He has actively supported the Conservative Party since 2013 and served as Chiswick Riverside Ward Chairman in 2014-15.

Fadi Farhat is a qualified lawyer who at the age of 19 represented his first client as a paralegal in the County Court. He is currently the Legal Director of a firm of Solicitors. He has acted for approximately 5,000 clients across various areas of the law including commercial, family disputes, employment law, immigration and asylum/human rights. He is a trustee and volunteer at the Richmond Legal Advice Service providing free legal advice.

He has been active in local Conservative politics for a number of years and colleagues say he has demonstrated a tremendous appetite for campaigning. He is a fiscal Conservative with a commitment to the free market and a broadly liberal approach to civil liberties.

Sam Hearn has represented Riverside Ward for the last ten years. He was elected this year as the leader of the Conservative Group of Hounslow Councillors. Sam is a qualified accountant and an economics graduate of Manchester University. He retired from full time employment in 2016. Sam remains a governor of the local primary school where his children were educated.

Cllr Hearn regularly speaks at Borough council meetings and focuses on providing an effective challenge to the Labour Administration’s management of the Borough’s finances. He is a member of the Housing and Environment Scrutiny Committee and chairs the Borough’s Pensions Board. As a Ward Councillor he has successfully taken up many issues that have concerned local residents from; the state of the roads and waste collection and recycling, to the introduction of CPZs and the replacement of street trees. He works closely with local amenity groups.

The Conservative Party candidates for the other two Chiswick wards were selected earlier in the summer.

September 16, 2017