Oxted resident, 35 year-old David Lee, has been the Liberal Democrat candidate for East Surrey since last summer and was elected with a 57% majority as the councillor for Whyteleafe in February this year. After graduating from Portsmouth University with a degree in German, he spent most of his twenties travelling the world, before pursuing a career in finance.

Having previously been involved in politics in Hammersmith, David is now much happier representing an area closer to where he lives. "I never had a wonderful epiphany to become a councillor," said David. "It took me a long time to work out the response to the question as to why I entered politics, but one day I was at a political gathering where Paddy Ashdown was speaking. I think his answer sums it up for me. When asked why he entered politics he simply said: "It's obvious isn't it? I want to change the world!"

So would David describe himself as an idealist?

"You have to be an idealist to go into politics. We are not paid to do this - we are volunteers. Liberal Democrats don't go into politics to get rich; I think we simply believe in what we are doing. We want to make a difference and change things for the better."

So what are David's priorities for East Surrey?

"I think the biggest priority at the moment has to be the economy," said David. "Until we have that turned around all the smaller local things will have to wait. There are very important things we need to do to improve Caterham town centre and other town centres in the district and there are other local issues we need to look at. One of the things that concerns me is that Horley doesn't have a sixth form college and the south of Tandridge doesn't have enough secondary schools, so I will campaign hard to get better education in the south of Tandridge."

During recent months David has visited a lot of primary schools in East Surrey.

"I was very impressed with the level of education but concerned about the amount of interference from central government," he said. "It is ridiculous the amount of bureaucracy our head teachers have to deal with. It should be up to the heads to decide what their priorities are for their school, and not some faceless bureaucrat in Whitehall."

David said that he is getting a very good reception on the campaign trail. He said: "I believe I am facing a much more level playing field, now that Peter Ainsworth is stepping down. Peter was a reasonably popular incumbent but the new Conservative candidate has not been involved in local politics and is still relatively unknown. I won the by-election very strongly in Whyteleafe and I know that we can win in East Surrey."