28 September 2009
More Liberal Woe in Wavertree
We'll need to see just how this develops but my initial reaction is that this doesn't look at all good for Colin Eldridge's campaign. Credit to Marc Waddington on this one.
25 September 2009
Greenbank Campaign
It's been nearly four months since the Euro Election campaign finished, and the results were announced. Being beaten by the BNP to that final seat was quite simply the lowest political moment I've ever experienced, and that moment, when we all realised at around 11.30pm on the night of the count, that we were going to lose, will stay with me for a long time.
If we had won a Euro seat, building a Green political future here in Liverpool and across the North West would have benefited from a huge boost. The huge disparity in resources between ourselves and our principal political competitors, Labour and the Liberal Democrats, would have been closed a little bit.
However, Green politics has never been easy. From the brave and forward thinking Greens that started things in Liverpool in the 1980s (you know who you are), to those of us who gave the local party a jump start in 2002, we've made the progress we have against the odds. Those of us active in Green politics certainly didn't come into politics with a career in mind - we did it because we believe that what we do now is going to be crucial for our future and the future of children.
Here in Liverpool in the Euro Elections, we gained over 11% of the city wide vote, nearly double our share of the vote in 2004. In two areas of the city, St Michaels and Greenbank, our tallies at the Euro count showed that we gained around 60% and 40% respectively, "winning" both these wards (the Lib Dems make the same type of claim about the Wavertree constituency via David Bartlett's local blog).
The challenge now for the Greens in Liverpool is to match the progress made by the Norwich Greens, who have gone from a position of just 2 city councillors in 2003 to being the second largest group on the council today, and polling more votes than any other party across the Norwich South constituency. To do that, we must double our number of councillors next year, and double them again, and again, and again.
That isn't going to be an easy task but it begins by doubling our councillor numbers next year. That means winning the final seat in St Michaels, our first seat in Greenbank and shaking things up with the formidable Elizabeth Pascoe in Wavertree ward. She can already point to her first Lib Dem scalp with Steve Hurst stepping down.
For a great many years, voters in Liverpool have only had a credible choice between Labour and the Liberal Democrats, with Steve Radford's Liberals in Tuebrook the only local anomaly. That has now changed and our task as the Green Party in Liverpool is to break the two party system that has dominated here for so long. It isn't going to be easy and we should expect both Labour and the Liberal Democrats to throw everything they've got at us.
Martin Dobson (our excellent 2008 Greenbank candidate) is not able to stand this time because of the success of his own business. I'm delighted to have been selected to stand here (where I stood in 2007) and take on the red and yellow election machines. I'll be doing my absolute best to ensure we repeat our European result, and win the ward again in 2010. We can campaign with confidence.
The record of our two elected Green councillors, John Coyne and Sarah Jennings, is one we can be very proud of. But there is a lot of work to do in what is likely to be a very close contest. It starts this weekend with a targeted leaflet in Greenbank.
If you are reading this and you want to help with the campaign, either by delivering leaflets, helping us to knock on doors or even just displaying a poster, then please email me - petercranie at greenparty.org.uk
If we had won a Euro seat, building a Green political future here in Liverpool and across the North West would have benefited from a huge boost. The huge disparity in resources between ourselves and our principal political competitors, Labour and the Liberal Democrats, would have been closed a little bit.
However, Green politics has never been easy. From the brave and forward thinking Greens that started things in Liverpool in the 1980s (you know who you are), to those of us who gave the local party a jump start in 2002, we've made the progress we have against the odds. Those of us active in Green politics certainly didn't come into politics with a career in mind - we did it because we believe that what we do now is going to be crucial for our future and the future of children.
Here in Liverpool in the Euro Elections, we gained over 11% of the city wide vote, nearly double our share of the vote in 2004. In two areas of the city, St Michaels and Greenbank, our tallies at the Euro count showed that we gained around 60% and 40% respectively, "winning" both these wards (the Lib Dems make the same type of claim about the Wavertree constituency via David Bartlett's local blog).
The challenge now for the Greens in Liverpool is to match the progress made by the Norwich Greens, who have gone from a position of just 2 city councillors in 2003 to being the second largest group on the council today, and polling more votes than any other party across the Norwich South constituency. To do that, we must double our number of councillors next year, and double them again, and again, and again.
That isn't going to be an easy task but it begins by doubling our councillor numbers next year. That means winning the final seat in St Michaels, our first seat in Greenbank and shaking things up with the formidable Elizabeth Pascoe in Wavertree ward. She can already point to her first Lib Dem scalp with Steve Hurst stepping down.
For a great many years, voters in Liverpool have only had a credible choice between Labour and the Liberal Democrats, with Steve Radford's Liberals in Tuebrook the only local anomaly. That has now changed and our task as the Green Party in Liverpool is to break the two party system that has dominated here for so long. It isn't going to be easy and we should expect both Labour and the Liberal Democrats to throw everything they've got at us.
Martin Dobson (our excellent 2008 Greenbank candidate) is not able to stand this time because of the success of his own business. I'm delighted to have been selected to stand here (where I stood in 2007) and take on the red and yellow election machines. I'll be doing my absolute best to ensure we repeat our European result, and win the ward again in 2010. We can campaign with confidence.
The record of our two elected Green councillors, John Coyne and Sarah Jennings, is one we can be very proud of. But there is a lot of work to do in what is likely to be a very close contest. It starts this weekend with a targeted leaflet in Greenbank.
If you are reading this and you want to help with the campaign, either by delivering leaflets, helping us to knock on doors or even just displaying a poster, then please email me - petercranie at greenparty.org.uk
23 September 2009
Out of Time
I've been rather busy. Two jobs until the end of the month and technically an 8 day week... However, politics continues and a couple of comments on the Lib Dem Conference are probably in order.
The Spectator reports that the Conservatives are delighted with the palpable disarray that has come across in the media. Clegg and even Cable have been given a hard time, and our own minor issues over the summer have to be seen in this perspective.
Early in the Conference, Clegg made a pitch for the Green vote, but I think he did it very badly. This is part of a Lib Dem strategy to "love bomb" our supporters (in the same way the Tories are trying to do this to Lib Dems).
Clegg's claim that Green voters should back the Lib Dems (because he says we can't win MPs) falls short of the honesty voters deserve after a summer of scandal. Norwich South is a genuine four way marginal I would say, but it is pretty clear that in Lewisham Deptford and particularly Brighton Pavilion, it is the Lib Dems who clearly can't win, with the Greens in a much stronger position. It is also a clearly obvious double standard to many liberal minded voters who see Lib Dems asking for votes everywhere (even when they are in third place or worse) but trying to attach the wasted vote to someone else.
If Clegg wanted to attract any tactical votes he needed to be much more honest about politics. The tired mantra that "only the Lib Dems" can beat Labour or the Conservatives just isn't credible with a lot of their target voters any more. If Clegg is serious about the environmental changes he wants, that means grown up politics and a mature acknowledgment that the Greens are better placed to win seats than the Lib Dems in some constituencies. The chances of such an acknowledgment are next to zero.
Clegg will find that in a campaign likely to go very badly for a third party, that he will need to swallow his pride and deal with the prospect of sharing realistic information with voters, rather than spin. He'll probably learn the lesson a little too late to prevent big Parliamentary losses for a party that has already lost 20% percent of its members in the last five years. This is a shame for the large number of fairly decent and hardworking Lib Dems that still exist at a council level.
What I want to finish on is our marvelous billboard that will be going up around Brighton in the next few days. Fantastic.
The Spectator reports that the Conservatives are delighted with the palpable disarray that has come across in the media. Clegg and even Cable have been given a hard time, and our own minor issues over the summer have to be seen in this perspective.
Early in the Conference, Clegg made a pitch for the Green vote, but I think he did it very badly. This is part of a Lib Dem strategy to "love bomb" our supporters (in the same way the Tories are trying to do this to Lib Dems).
Clegg's claim that Green voters should back the Lib Dems (because he says we can't win MPs) falls short of the honesty voters deserve after a summer of scandal. Norwich South is a genuine four way marginal I would say, but it is pretty clear that in Lewisham Deptford and particularly Brighton Pavilion, it is the Lib Dems who clearly can't win, with the Greens in a much stronger position. It is also a clearly obvious double standard to many liberal minded voters who see Lib Dems asking for votes everywhere (even when they are in third place or worse) but trying to attach the wasted vote to someone else.
If Clegg wanted to attract any tactical votes he needed to be much more honest about politics. The tired mantra that "only the Lib Dems" can beat Labour or the Conservatives just isn't credible with a lot of their target voters any more. If Clegg is serious about the environmental changes he wants, that means grown up politics and a mature acknowledgment that the Greens are better placed to win seats than the Lib Dems in some constituencies. The chances of such an acknowledgment are next to zero.
Clegg will find that in a campaign likely to go very badly for a third party, that he will need to swallow his pride and deal with the prospect of sharing realistic information with voters, rather than spin. He'll probably learn the lesson a little too late to prevent big Parliamentary losses for a party that has already lost 20% percent of its members in the last five years. This is a shame for the large number of fairly decent and hardworking Lib Dems that still exist at a council level.
What I want to finish on is our marvelous billboard that will be going up around Brighton in the next few days. Fantastic.
13 September 2009
Democracy
Or to be more precise, Representative Democracy. I'm delivering two lectures on government and understanding what is a Representative Democracy tomorrow.
Democracy is supposed to be the will of the people and Representative Democracy should therefore represent the will of the people. You and I both know that it is an imperfect system (or least worst). I'm looking forward to the views of the two student groups I am meeting for the first time tomorrow.
Anyone with any words of wisdom about the good, bad and ugly sides of democracy, feel free to contribute here now - I might just add your contribution into the session.
Democracy is supposed to be the will of the people and Representative Democracy should therefore represent the will of the people. You and I both know that it is an imperfect system (or least worst). I'm looking forward to the views of the two student groups I am meeting for the first time tomorrow.
Anyone with any words of wisdom about the good, bad and ugly sides of democracy, feel free to contribute here now - I might just add your contribution into the session.
8 September 2009
Steve Hurst Will Not Stand Again
It has taken months of pressure from all the other political parties, but Steve Hurst is now going to do the decent thing and not stand again for office.
There has undoubtedly been internal pressure. Colin Eldridge is putting everything he can into becoming an MP in Wavertree constituency, and for him to fight a General Election at a time when everyone in Wavertree ward would continually be reminded that the local Lib Dem councillor had a criminal conviction for an electoral offence, would simply have been untenable. I like to think that the prospect of a serious Green challenge also put the wind up the Lib Dems in what is one of their safest seats.
What little sympathy I have for Cllr Hurst - it is very little given the nature of the material he distributed - is based on an opinion expressed by a number of people locally, including Rex Makin, that the entire operation to design, produce and distribute a leaflet, during an election campaign, could have been done by one individual. Cllr Hurst is certainly carrying the can. He should have done the decent thing months ago but this is a victory for public pressure, and a mood to clean up politics in Liverpool.
There has undoubtedly been internal pressure. Colin Eldridge is putting everything he can into becoming an MP in Wavertree constituency, and for him to fight a General Election at a time when everyone in Wavertree ward would continually be reminded that the local Lib Dem councillor had a criminal conviction for an electoral offence, would simply have been untenable. I like to think that the prospect of a serious Green challenge also put the wind up the Lib Dems in what is one of their safest seats.
What little sympathy I have for Cllr Hurst - it is very little given the nature of the material he distributed - is based on an opinion expressed by a number of people locally, including Rex Makin, that the entire operation to design, produce and distribute a leaflet, during an election campaign, could have been done by one individual. Cllr Hurst is certainly carrying the can. He should have done the decent thing months ago but this is a victory for public pressure, and a mood to clean up politics in Liverpool.
4 September 2009
Missing Conference
This has been the first time since 2001 that I have missed a Green Party Conference. I envy everyone who is able to be there, because there is nothing quite like a conference atmosphere for motivating you. The reason is purely financial and I don't mind being honest about it.
I've donated (and paid in subs) many thousands of £s to the Green party, mostly while working part time in the last six years in order to devote as much time as I could to politics. There was nothing left to spare by June. Missing out on election meant that I needed to get full time employment once again, particularly after I found out that my current part time role would come to an end this month. The charity I work for has had to relocate jobs to their head office in London.
It has not been easy and anyone out there that is unemployed and looking for work will be finding it incredibly difficult. I applied for over 20 jobs in the months since, I've had only two interviews and it was only on Friday afternoon that I was able to accept a job offer. I'll be going back into full time FE teaching.
The new job is just what I was looking for and I'm delighted to get it. There were times I felt that hourly part time work combined with some self employed work was going to be as good as it would get for me in the current economic climate. The new job also means I'll be able to afford to be at the next Conference, but it does have implications for Thursdays and Fridays, as teaching doesn't allow for days off in term time.
I hope those of you at Conference are enjoying it!
I've donated (and paid in subs) many thousands of £s to the Green party, mostly while working part time in the last six years in order to devote as much time as I could to politics. There was nothing left to spare by June. Missing out on election meant that I needed to get full time employment once again, particularly after I found out that my current part time role would come to an end this month. The charity I work for has had to relocate jobs to their head office in London.
It has not been easy and anyone out there that is unemployed and looking for work will be finding it incredibly difficult. I applied for over 20 jobs in the months since, I've had only two interviews and it was only on Friday afternoon that I was able to accept a job offer. I'll be going back into full time FE teaching.
The new job is just what I was looking for and I'm delighted to get it. There were times I felt that hourly part time work combined with some self employed work was going to be as good as it would get for me in the current economic climate. The new job also means I'll be able to afford to be at the next Conference, but it does have implications for Thursdays and Fridays, as teaching doesn't allow for days off in term time.
I hope those of you at Conference are enjoying it!
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