Voting for Willy Bach as PPC this Thursday!

This Thursday we get our chance to vote for a truly local candidate as Police and Crime Commissioner - a candidate, moreover, who has actual experience of the law and leading big bureaucratic organisations.

Willy is obviously the best qualified candidate - but everyone still needs to vote on Thursday. The PPC elections are not popular but they are important.  Look at what happened last time - police stations closed, only some crimes investigated.  Policing matters and the responsibilities of PPCs are only going to increase, with Theresa May talking about hiving off all emergency services and even the courts.  It's time to make the right decision for everyone in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.

If you haven't already voted by post, voting in person is at your usual polling station from 7am to 10pm.

Labour in Leicester and Leicestershire Conference

I don't know about you, but I still miss the Political Education Days we used to have in our constituency.  I remember Roy Hattersley on House of Lords Reform and Chris Mullins on the Birmingham Six.

Today Rory Palmer emailed a number of us with the following.  It seems Political Education is alive and well in Leicester - and we are invited.

David F is putting it on the agenda for January 5.  Maybe we can get up a busload or something.  I'm certainly up for it.

Labour in Leicester and Leicestershire Conference 2016
Saturday 23^rd January 2016 at Leicester Town Hall. 10:00am – 5:00pm
This conference will bring together Labour members from across Leicester and Leicestershire to hear from a range of speakers including members of the Shadow Cabinet and to discuss local and national policy areas.
The conference will hear from a range of speakers including Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury Seema Malhotra MP and Shadow Cabinet member Jon Ashworth MP.

Speakers also include Leicester West MP Liz Kendall on the EU Referendum and Leicester’s City Mayor Peter Soulsby who will give a report on progress in delivering Leicester Labour’s 2015 Manifesto.

Policy Workshops will cover areas of national and local significance, including: the future of public services including the NHS, schools and the police & 999 services; plans to grow Leicester/shire’s economy and create jobs and what devolution could mean for our area, and; Labour’s approach to improving living standards and tackling inequalities at a time of shrinking public sector budgets.
There will also be a range of informal sessions including an introduction to Labour Party structures for newer members; training on the EU Referendum campaign; a session for members interested in becoming a councillor/ candidate; and much more.
This conference will be a timely opportunity for Labour members in Leicester and Leicestershire to meet ahead of the Police & Crime Commissioner election next year; the EU Referendum; and County Council elections in 2017.
The conference is organised and hosted by the Leicester City Council Labour Group. 

In the meantime MERRY CHRISTMAS to all.  Here's to an active and electorally successful New Year!

Euro Launch Leicester

Rory Palmer and Glenis Willmott launch Labour's Euro Election campaign at the Clock Tower in Leicester, Tuesday May 6th 2014.

The results are in

Contrary to what some pundits were predicting, former Air Chief Marshal Sir Clive Loader won the PCC election for the Tories.  The turnout was a pathetic - just 15.98%.

There was no outright winner after the first count.  Sir Clive had 59915 votes, Sarah Russell 42051, and the independent Suleman Nagdi 21744.  After Nagdi's votes were redistributed to the second choice the final outcome was Tories 64661, Lab 51835.  In other words, an archetypical Tory got 25% of the largely Asian, largely city vote, we got 50% give or take, and 25% expressed no second preference.

The results here in Harborough District were a slightly better turnout of 18.7%, Con 8424, Lab 2262 and Ind 1446.

What does this tell us?  Firstly, the public does not like the idea of an elected PCC.  Labour should pledge to abolish the post forthwith.  Secondly, the absence of LibDems does not automatically mean more Labour votes.  Thirdly, the Asian vote, as I have been saying for some time, is not to be taken for granted as Labour.  It is far more subtle than that.  Finally and most importantly it tells us that people recoil from politics as the game has traditionally been conducted.

This was even the case in Corby where Andy Sawford achieved a thumping victory and the LibDems lost their deposit.  Take nothing away from the achievement of Andy and his team but the turnout - in Corby, which has been roundly betrayed by the Tories, in the media spotlight and with all the political heavyweights in town - was only 44.8%.

Britain is becoming anti-political.  It suits the Tories and the right wing press to encourage the antagonism.  We in Labour have to find new, better ways of engaging with and motivating the people who instinctively side with us.

One day to go...

Writing in The Independent today, John Curtice, Professor of Politics at Strathclyde University, has Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland down as a good Labour prospect tomorrow.  Clearly, he bases his prognostication on the whopping Labour vote in the city.  We won't get all that tomorrow; on the other hand, the disaffected Asian vote will largely go to the independent with, in the absence of a LibDem, Labour as second preference.  For once, the Labour vote in the county will be critical.  We should win in the north - Charnwood, Coalville etc - but the east is a write-off, except in Melton, and Hinckley & Bosworth is never easy to call.  So it is clearly important that here in the south we get our Labour votes in early, when nobody's looking, and do nothing to startle the Tories.

VOTE EARLY---VOTE LABOUR---VOTE SARAH.

From the achives

As politics grinds towards its summer hiatus, you have to think laterally to find items of local demographic interest.  That led me to Britain From Above, a new site from English Heritage and the National Lottery.

This is how Lutterworth looked in October 1927.  There are five other aerial photos of Lutterworth.  You can access them here.  I don't think it would have been much of a happy hunting ground for us back then.  Most of the places our supporters live aren't there!  On the other hand, it would have been much quicker to leaflet.

For those whose canvassing practice extends further afield, Leicester in 1927 is here.  Some city landmarks have not changed much but the East Gates one has me flummoxed.

Inexplicably, there are no photos of Broughton Astley.