Genus Loci - Printed and Promoted by John Brace (Liberal Democrats), 28 Falkland Street, Birkenhead, CH41 0BD. Published by Six Apart Ltd. 548 4th St San Francisco, CA 94107 USA
Well the Liberal Democrats are up to 21% in the polls (with the initial article reading 23% initially!) which is much improved. Vince Cable is doing a good job as acting leader.
However one of our two Liberal Democrat MEPs here in North West England (Saj Karim) has defected to the Conservatives. This it seems is partly in response to party members putting him 2nd on the list of candidates for 2009. So as he's left the party now, whoever was number 3 gets bumped up to position 2 (or maybe we'll just have to run the whole thing again). Personally I wish Cllr. Flo Clucas (Liverpool councillor) hadn't withdrawn her name from the list. She lost votes because of the postal strike in Liverpool (the timing of which was unfortunate).
Oh well, at least at the university our Liberal Democrat Society is going from strength to strength - we're going to have a social after the meeting tomorrow and Christmas Party the week after. Students like a good party, especially if it involved alcohol! :D
Well the Conservatives (from what I've been gathering), seem to be persuing blogging (and regular blogging at that) as a campaign tactic locally.
Course, as all my many readers here now, there are bloggers that chatter away at their keys typing words that very few people will read, then there's the other end of the scale - the Shoemoneys, John Chow etc of the world who make blogging really into a business.
However what blogs all need (and why they tend to fall by the wayside rather quickly) is regular updating (enough updating to make sure readers don't get turned off by the lack of anything new).
Unlike many in my party (Liberal Democrat - if you haven't gathered already) I'm not terribly anti-Conservative, but in the battle for voters hearts and minds the internet is networking to the nth level.
So for my blogging friends here's a few tips on blogging...
1) Submit your best pieces to social network sites (eg digg, reddit etc etc) 2) Submit your RSS feed to the RSS feed search engines to gain a wider audience
Course there are the usual things about being controversial etc... but that's if you just want to go high profile. I did see an example of lazy journalism though. A Daily Mirror journalist had misquoted a Conservative blogger's blog post to make it sound more controversial.
The quote the journalist made (and I'm sorry I can't find both these pages to compare) made it out that this blogger saw the death (triggering a byelection) of a Liberal Democrat councillor as a good thing.
Anyone who actually read the blog post though, would find that that was squashing together about three paragraphs. Yes, he had said the Liberal Democrat councillor had died (he/she even commented on what a good community campaigner they were), but later on he'd said that the campaigning it was forcing the Conservatives to do was a good thing... which is totally different from saying you're glad somebody is dead for partisan reasons!
I'm pretty sure that the postal votes are being sent out by second class mail - however they were posted out on Friday 20th April.
Therefore I'd have expected to receive mine this morning - no such luck! Then again there are 934 postal votes for this ward (which must make about 22,000 for Wirral) and I doubt the Cheshire sorting office gets that much mail at once outside of Christmas/elections.
Anyway, I await in hope for the one election's postal vote in 9 years of voting (and 6 years in which I could stand as the minimum age has been 21 until they lowered it to 18 this year) where my name is on the ballot paper and I can (rather selfishly) vote for myself!
Yay well that's one vote I know I've got. Now I just persuade a further 1,014 to switch their vote to me to win. Hmm, with 10 days - one leaflet going to 2,000 voters - even with the disillusionment there is towards Labour right now - it would take something very unexpected to even delay this election (eg one of us five candidates dropped dead or a few were disqualified), never mind to win it.
Oh well everyone has to learn to lose first in order to figure out what not to do (or what to do) to win! :) Perhaps I should just come up with some Vote Liberal Democrat web banners or something... anything that doesn't much money (one of my sites get about 7,000 visitors a day - some must be from the UK) has got to be good for mildly worrying the opposition.
They removed my Youtube video from the local website as they said without the sidebar of links back on the page it looks "unprofessional" - sighs. I wonder if other parties also torpedo their own candidate's campaigns too.
I've been reminded about the targeting strategy, that I shouldn't be doing investigations or using resources. I made reassurances before this election that I wouldn't use anyone willing to help out in a target ward. I've also helped with deliveries (once already, have another lot so twice) in one safe seat, have two lots for another safe-ish seat, helped out in a target seat over the weekend and will be helping out in Liverpool tomorrow.
If I do one thing positive it'll be over the next twelve months to get a functioning Liberal Democrat youth/student group going in Birkenhead and/or Liverpool/Liverpool University. To be honest it's one of the best ways to get new members and at 26 (still the youngest member in a 2 mile radius or so) I'm tired of being seen as the baby of the party locally....
Anyways.... time for another Youtube video I think (if I can remember which day of the campaign I'm on).
Other that that met the renter of the bookstore whose litigation is holding up the Lime Street Gateway Project (he lost his case, but hasn't been sent the judgement - once he gets that he'll appeal).
Went to the Halifax to pay in some cash takings and they persuaded me to open a personal account and transfer my account to them from HSBC. It makes sense as they're offering me a decent rate of interest on a current account although I'll have to sort out the payments into the account transferred over to the new one myself.
When I'm feeling brave there's last year's tax return to do, but I think I'll go to SHS International tomorrow instead. Anyway roll on leafleting in Liverpool tomorrow, meeting the Wavertree PPC agent and so mysterious Lib Demmer called Cat. Well I hope this Cat is female, young and good looking. ;)
All the best, if you do have any questions or would just like to comment, please feel free.
I'll just cobble together my speech for May 3rd. Oh and in a complete coincidence, whilst waiting for a friend that was late outside the Town Hall in Seacombe I met gravecat's mum who was walking to her parents along the main road. I haven't seen Nicky in many years.
I've taken some photos of James Street station's mural. However I forgot to rename the files and when I uploaded them they overwrote some on the website already there.
So an earlier post about pictures of the cathedral & Liverpool might now be showing a mural instead. I'll try and find the copies of the earlier ones and switch them back later.
At least the flash worked! Once I shrink them down to a reasonable size (and rotate some of them 90 degrees) I'll put them here.
The "ghost" platform at James Street is in use again as the Liverpool Loop (Moorfields, Central and Lime Street Wirral Line sections are all shut with rail replacement buses running) is closed for a week for engineering work. As the station is getting a multi million pound refurbishment in June, I thought I'd better take snaps of this while I can. From reading the plaque it wasn't as old as I thought - only 1999, but then I've only really been regularly using the train to Liverpool since 2002...
I went to a full meeting of the local council yesterday (supposed to start at 6 - went on for hours). Saw how well... party political they get leading up to an election with their war of words. One of them said a Labour MP had a fascist policy in saying people causing antisocial behaviour should live under the motorway (was in reference to taking a measure to take their housing benefit away), the implication taken by the Conservatives and Labour was that they'd referred to my MP (Frank Field) as fascist. *grins* Well it was quite fun in a way - Iraq War got mentioned, Cameron, Thatcher, the Labour leader had a beer belly on him and I realise who's been writing all their leaflets now.
Strangely enough the "transport cuts" I raised as an issue 6 months ago were on last night's agenda with the scrapping of the subsidy of half price children's fares on the buses. Labour did the usual "we won't spend public money that just goes to private companies" "it costs too much" "if we didn't do this we'd have to put up council tax" "think of the council tax payers" "we'd have had to be capped and set an illegal budget" etc etc
Was very... divisive really and on all items people toed the party line. It's a shame at times they can't just get along more. However it showed the Liberal Democrats (19 out of 66) do hold the balance of power between the Tories and Labour. Both need Liberal Democrat support to get any measure through. *grins* Labour seemed to imply that we're too liberal and want a world without rules though. *smiles* These politicians - if it wasn't all so serious & actually affected people's lives it would be amusing the way they carry on...
When I came out found someone had stolen by bicycle helmet - oh well, I suppose it was there on the prom at the back of the Town Hall in Seacombe from about 4.15p.m. to 10.30p.m. ... *sighs*
Oh just little update, went canvassing with Ethel - plenty of issues brought up - housing, education, flytipping etc. I visited the Surestart centre (sorry children's centre as they've renamed it to now) and spoke with the mananger there.
The whole issue of "reasonable chastisement" came up. As the manager pointed out - past the age of 16 certain things done by parents would be classed as assault - Ethel happened to make quite clear her views as a mother on smacking.
The visit to the local housing office was interesting too - one of the new workers there asked if I had a surgery. All this is helping me get a better idea of the issues in the area - the housing office is for Wirral Partnership Homes which is the body the council houses were sold to a few years ago.
There are parts of the ward I have yet to venture in, parts that I think a candidate would have to be:-
a) intrepid and b) better off in a group
Having said that there have been a number of arrests in the areas with a reputation as part of the government's respect agenda. I should go out take some photos and post them here as I'm sure they tell a better story than I can spin in words.
Well in a suprise (to me anyway), there aren't just four people standing (sitting Labour councillor, Liberal Democrat, Conservative, Green) but a fifth independent candidate too called George Thomas.
Whereas I think more candidates, higher turnout etc is good, it means the ~ 2,000 votes will be split five ways instead of four (well three if you discount the 160 or so votes the Greens will get).
When the current Labour councillor was elected back in 2004, he got a majority of 1,277 (up a little on his initial majority in 2003 of 717). As in 2003 when a "Wirral Independent Network" - notice how that abbreviates to WIN candidate stood, I think the presence of two mainstream candidates, the Greens and an independent will mean instead of a majority in the 1,000 mark - it'll be more like the one he had in 2003.
However, 8,000+ people didn't both to vote last time. If anyone could convince even 13% of the non-voters to vote for them they'd win here! :)
It remains to be seen what happens on May 3rd. I wish all the candidates - George Bowler (Green), John Brace - myself (Liberal Democrats), Fiona Marsh (Conservative), Harry Smith (Labour) & George Thomas (independent) luck in the next three weeks.
Whereas previously working here (until he resigned) does qualify him to stand as a candidate, the independent candidate lives about 13 miles away! I am the only candidate with a home address in this ward (where I have lived since June 2004).
Well this is the best one I took after realising that self-timer + white background + short distance to camera + indoors + flash = overexposure (too much white everywhere). A different background helped and this is one of two (print/web) I'm emailing to that journalist who interviewed me yesterday.
For your perusal - please click on the smaller image to get to the print version. I should really put them on the local party website too - maybe when I come back from Ireland.
Well I went out canvassing today (on my own). The list I had was the adults on the electoral roll for Oxton ward aged between 18 and 30. This came to about 500 individuals (although I should've waited until I had only the voters - which comes to about 130). I had a good time (although there were a lot of unmade, muddy roads).
Although plenty of students were away at university, most of my generation was still undecided, some had moved house or were in the Armed Forces I did get some definite information (along with a couple of 16/17 year olds who will vote Liberal Democrat when they turn 18):-
1 Labour 1 Communist Party member (I think this person was being sarcastic because I woke them up at about noon and their brother said allegedly to it) 2 Lib Dems
(about 10% of the 18-30 voters but plenty of outs/undecideds)
This straw poll broadly reflects the vote last May - 55.4% lib dem (2 out of 4), 17.3% labour (1 out of 4), others (1 out of 4). Of course those were the results in a Liberal Democrat friendly ward (with three sitting councillors - all Liberal Democrat). It did however identify some prospective members, identify two pieces of casework (one young person, one father of young person - although not the young person I've just mentioned) which coincidentally were in the same road, just across the street from each other.
I used to go to school (15 years ago) with one of them - he wanted to go door to door with a questionnaire about traffic calming (eg 20mph zone, speed bumps etc) - partly because of it being in the just delivered Oxton focus. He said he'd vote for us if we made the street he lived in safer (is currently being used as a shortcut to avoid a set of traffic lights & during the school run - also plenty of speeding as it's downhill (some double parking too)) - I'll see what the local councillors and transport section of Wirral Council have to say (should email him too).
After I'd done two pages of canvassing I went to the Queen's Arms for Sunday lunch - walked back to my bike and came home. Anyway, perhaps during the week 6p.m. to 9p.m. will be a better time to find people indoors (especially when the weather's good). It went well though!
I wonder what the issues raised in the ward I live in (Bidston & St. James) will be. Hopefully I can get through the young voters in Oxton before the exec committee meeting on Thursday. Prenton is a bit awkward EARS wise as it's split in half between Wirral West and Birkenhead. Anyway.... as usually comments appreciated!
Well I had a bit of a political Friday really! After work (boring computer repair stuff - parts etc) I went to my local MP's surgery (Frank Field (Lab) - Birkenhead). Got to meet him after about 8 other people had gone in before me but had a good chat with some of the people waiting. Left that about 7.10p.m. I went straight from that to the constituency executive committee meeting (starting at 7.30p.m. - was ~ 7 minutes late but no-one seemed to mind).
Put my name forward as candidate for Bidston ward (ward I live in) for local elections in May. It's pretty much the safest Labour seat around though! :) I happen to live in the ward - but none of the local Labour councillors do.
A lot was discussed at the executive committee meeting (very long meeting - finished ~ 9p.m. or perhaps later - was it 9.30p.m.)? It was well attended though - Cllrs Kelly, Bridson, Doyle, Holbrook, Southwood as well as others.
I'm optimistic about how things will be going over the next few months but we kicked PPC selection into the long grass - I think nobody expects a General Election this year unless Labour go into total meltdown once Blair exits.
Joined in in the quiz afterwards. Our team "Where's Eric" won with 33 points (other 3 teams got 32). When Cllr. Reisdorf went to the bar I changed the answer to the state in America with most electoral college votes after California to Texas - which meant we won. Cllr Kelly (leader of the Lib Dem Group) wasn't too pleased - but Cllr. Holbrook said I showed leadership potential. They're all very nice and very friendly people. Politics is a good place to be when you know people.
Paula and I chatted about the Green Lib Dems a bit after the meeting - she initiated the day of the meetings being changed from Friday to Thursday (I agreed with her although it was close - 6 to 5). Anyway, would seem I have four months or so to actually do something (don't want to be the sort of paper candidate that puts out one leaflet - although that's all Labour seem to do each year).
Let's see who Labour will probably have up again this year for reelection. Councillor Harry Smith elected in June 2004 with a majority of 1,277 on a turnout of 27.2%. Seems he's the 2nd most popular councillor out of three in the ward. So to win, I'd need to convince ~1,278 more people to vote Liberal Democrat - well possible given a few years to a decade I suppose!!!
Anyway, it's all good experience (although I don't know what my parents will say about it all)...
I made a Squidoo lens (mainly to promote the RSS feed).
Have been trying to get the Wirral Liberal Democrat (before) and after (albeit with rollover images still to fix) better. I'm beginning to think a blog format (or at least the ability to leave comments) would be the best thing for political stuff such as this. Of course they'd still want editorial control over comments.
So far my first draft - not online yet</strike> - still adding the finishing touches has added:-
Search box (Google Adsense for Search) Moved round the graphics Made the text larger and easier to read
Personally I'm thinking the sidebar could just as easily be written in HTML rather than images (which as they don't currently have alt tags is very hard for blind visitors) which would be far better for search engine spiders and improve page loading times. Then again - it's really the promotion/SEO side of the site that needs working on - RSS feed, links to the site, favicon - that sort of thing.
Yes, I know the current colour scheme needs to be changed. Maybe I should just offer a choice of an extremely radical redesign (but then on a site with hundreds of pages it's difficult to change too much at once)!
No, not those type of ears, but EARS - Election Agents Record System . Well it was interesting spending half an hour with EARS (even EARS for the wrong constituency). Hopefully once I get the right constituency and have done say a ward canvas of the target group I'll have a list of names. I did update some addresses/phone numbers on it too. If I'd gone to the historical data I should've been able to find myself pre 2004. I'll get in touch with the other Alan and Peter tomorrow - not sure how much to do off my own iniative and how much to get permission for especially as I don't start for two weeks - it's always best to have a plan though! :)
It seems, as has happened in the past - people from "real life" are connecting me with my blog here. I don't really mind - although the first person to do a while ago read something about herself. It's just odd for me personally to have the online/offline worlds collide so to speak. Yes I realise there are people in front of these words I type here. Yes I got a little giddy when they reprinted a quote from this blog in the Guardian a while back in the "Today on the web" feature on Doctor Who.( Read more on blogging, comments, Darrell, Wirral LDYS )
Cycling along the cycle path on the way home this afternoon I saw a demo on the common ground by St. James (well what was the roundabout and is not a series of traffic lights). They had some cloth material with words painted in blue (not all spelt correctly) held into the ground with two stakes each. There were two of this with reasonably large letters (so the cars waiting at the lights could see them). One of the two people there had a megaphone. The other had at least one tattoo and a cut on his lip. I asked this one what it was about. He said the other person there had had a daughter who'd been murdered. The murderer had had his sentence of 21 years reduced to 18 years on appeal - so that's what the protest was about. To be perfectly honest the only other protest I've seen in the Bidston & St. James' area was also about crime and punishment. I would've taken photos if I'd had a camerphone - but my mobile was at home recharging.
Came home earlier than expected because Ethel didn't meet me as arranged. I should give her a ring to see what went on (whether she forget, was asleep etc). I have a meeting of the executive committee of the Birkenhead constituency this evening at the Birkenhead Liberal Club at 7.30p.m. so need to keep an eye on the time. My schedule is getting quite full this weekend what with Anne's rearranged Winter Warmer on Saturday and a birthday party on Sunday.
Strangely enough merely half a day after writing this entry about Iraq I get an email from Sir Menzies Campbell about Iraq. As it's quite good and on topic (sent to hundreds if not thousands) I'll repost it here:-
Of all the problems that face our country today, the situation in Iraq is the most tragic; not only because of the scale of the catastrophe in that country - food shortages, electricity and oil supplies still below their pre-war levels, and the rise of sectarian violence with 3000 deaths per month - but because this terrible situation could and should have been avoided.
Liberal Democrats opposed the 2003 invasion on principle. It was an illegal war, fought without a proper plan for postwar reconstruction. We also now know that it was launched on a flawed prospectus. Weapons of Mass Destruction - ready to fire within forty minutes of a command - simply did not exist.
Last month Liberal Democrats joined with others to vote in the House of Commons for a motion that would have initiated an investigation into the war in Iraq and its aftermath. Unfortunately the government narrowly defeated that motion.
Three and a half years after the occupation, Iraq is on the verge of civil war, and its population is united only in its hostility to the presence of coalition troops (a Ministry of Defence survey found that eight out of ten strongly opposed their presence). Last month, Sir Richard Dannatt, our most senior solider said that the presence of British soldiers is making the security situation worse. The difficulties that they are experiencing, and Sir Richard's comments, are a reminder that in addition to our responsibilities to the Iraqi people, we have an obligation to our armed forces to provide them with a clear strategy and a credible mission.
Our government should heed those words and change its strategy now. I have made this point to Tony Blair in the House of Commons. He has refused to change his position. America is openly debating its strategy, and our Prime Minister is awaiting decisions from Washington. Britain's foreign policy is once again reliant on America's, just as it was in Lebanon.
There is another way. We need a phased withdrawal from Iraq - and sooner rather than later. That means taking a number of steps in the immediate future: establishing a UN-led effort to disarm, reintegrating and rebuilding the state, with support from the World bank and international donors; creating a regional contact group to engage Iraq's neighbours in defusing sectarianism and helping to reconstruct the country; speeding up the training of Iraq's security forces and depoliticising them; an end to the indefinite detentions by Iraqi and US forces that enrage the population; and full access granted to UN human rights monitors and the Red Cross.
These are the conditions that will allow a phased security transfer and withdrawal of coalition troops in months rather than years - and may be the only hope for securing a peaceful future in Iraq.
Yours sincerely
Sir Menzies Campbell Leader, Liberal Democrats
P.S. Online registration for our UK-wide spring conference in Harrogate in now open at http://www.libdems.org.uk/conference/conference-registration.html I hope you will come to conference and take part in our debates, benefit from the free training on offer and enjoy the exchange of ideas and information on the fringe.
------- The small print: Published and promoted by and on behalf of Liberal Democrats, 4 Cowley Street, London, SW1P 3NB, (020) 7222 7999. Dispatched (printed) by Connectpoint Direct, 19B Quay Street, Manchester M3 3HN.
Edit:- For my non-UK readers the Liberal Democrats are the third largest political party (with 10% of MPs, 22% of the national vote (yeah roll on PR)) in the UK - Charles Kennedy MP was their leader until he well resigned for the good of the party shall we say
One minute I'm reading the headline "Kennedy expected to resign" - a few minutes later I go to the page and it's "Kennedy quits as Lib Dem leader".
*mutters about time*
Oh well that means I get to vote who the new one is. Hmm let's look at the contenders and what I think of them:-
Sir Menzies Campbell Mark Oaten David Laws Nick Clegg
Well to be perfectly honest I think we need somebody younger, dynamic, photogenic with less of a past - like Sarah Teather (she'd get a lot of the LDYS votes!):-
but that's just my view as a 25 year old male. :) I wonder if she'll stand though.
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genus_loci's journal
I'm pretty sure that the postal votes are being sent out by second class mail - however they were posted out on Friday 20th April.
Councillor Harry Smith elected in June 2004 with a majority of 1,277 on a turnout of 27.2%. Seems he's the 2nd most popular councillor out of three in the ward. So to win, I'd need to convince ~1,278 more people to vote Liberal Democrat - well possible given a few years to a decade I suppose!!!
contemplative
amused