November’s drop-in at the mall hinted that we’d be working at this together. The 25th of January looks set to be the date of the next update. Take a trip to the mall that day 8am to 6pm.
Author: Mike Cordingley
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Seven Days to go
How do you think it’s going? Are you fed up with the lot us? What do your friends think? Is it going to change anything?
Are you fed up with all the leaflets?
Or should I ask, “Have you seen any leaflets?â€
I’ve only been made aware of Labour and Lib Dem printed material. Neither of the other parties seem to have even put out an election address.
The next door seat of Altrincham is very busy but we seem to be campaigning alone here.
So who is winning the national race?
I don’t know about you, but I was expecting a very different election. I think we may have built Johnson up as this great campaigner, but he really isn’t very good and he’s turned out to be distinctly cowardly.
The country desperately needs a radical Labour government to reset the dial towards a high skilled, fairly distributed, healthy, society.
We have the policies (perhaps a tad too many… ) and they’re good ones. This should be a straight-forward landslide if it were not for Brexit.
There is no easy political solution available to Labour on the question of Brexit and I am content enough with where we are on that.
But it’s clear that only Labour has the policies to redress the imbalances in the economy and move us to towards a much more productive and sustainable society with no one left behind.
The Scandinavian economic model is very much suited to 21st century UK.
Locally
Totally in awe of Kate Green. I don’t know how she has so much energy.
There’s a huge amount of personal enthusiasm. The candidate still can make a difference. It’s the last seven days, please make sure you vote Labour, vote Kate Green.
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Anti-Semitism
This taints us all in Labour. I’m ashamed. I’m disgusted. It is getting worse.
It is not easy. I stay and fight.
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Nominations are in
Pleasing to see it in black and white. We have our election. No surprises. I like the monster raving loony party, but they never seem to stand here. I want to be next to Lord Buckethead’s agent at a count. In 2019, we’ve just got the Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem, Green and Brexit parties. This is serious.
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Stressing the agent
Another occasional post on being agent for Kate Green
This Monday was in effect the start. Trafford issued their notice of election. If feels as though we’ve been in election mode for a while but Monday was the start.
Do we downplay the civic aspects of an election these days? I have vague memories of the notice going up in the windows of post offices when I was young, but I might be wrong. Nevertheless, the wording of the notice is almost worthy of the an announcement on the steps of the town hall. Instead it’s slipped out onto the council’s website.
The notice is an invitation for candidates to be nominated, and voters to be registered assuming they’re not already on the register. It gives the dates for when these have to take place.
No one wants to leave the nomination until the last day, so for most candidates it really gives two days to have the papers submitted.
There’s two vital forms, the nominations and the consent to nomination. Providing these are in order and submitted on time the candidate is on the ballot paper. There’s authorities from the political party and appointment of agent that we also submit but technically they’re of secondary importance. We elect the candidate, not the party and you don’t actually have to have an agent.
If you have an agent, it’s the agent who goes to jail if the rules are breached rather than the candidate. So most candidates appoint an agent.
The nomination paper is interesting. We used to put in a great deal of effort in inviting community leaders and respected figures across the constituency to sign the nomination papers. It was quite a thing. The names of the persons nominating the candidate definitely were published in those post office windows, so it mattered. These days you’ve got to go looking on the council website to even find the papers. It’s lost its impact. It’s a shame really.
Having said that, the decline in public curiosity as to the persons nominating Kate made it easier for me. I had sufficient nominations signed and verified in one sitting of the Labour Group instead of cycling round the constituency to get the signatures.
Even if it was less of a task I’m still mightily relieved they’re checked and submitted.
So, Kate Green is now Labour Party candidate for Stretford and Urmston!
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Being Agent
I’m delighted Kate Green has asked me to be her agent for the forthcoming election. It’ll be my fourth time. At least I’ll know what I’m letting myself in for. It’s a generally thankless role. You’re really there to make sure everything’s legal and accounted for and to step back into the shadows.
My first time as agent was 2010. Kate was stepping in to fill the shoes of Bev Hughes. Labour were facing a difficult election nationally and the Tories were targeting the seat as winnable. Kate was (and still is) an absolute force of nature. We had a great team with Antony McCaul directing the campaign. Together we smashed that election.
It was a fantastic team effort. I took the role incredibly seriously. I still do. You’re always a missed signature away from a disaster that lets down so many people. At the same time you’re trying to be a grounding force, keeping the campaign focused and together. There’s so many external provocations not to mention those from within the campaign.
The two subsequent elections in 2015 and 2017 were somewhat different. We didn’t see any serious campaign from the Conservatives really, or anyone else for that matter. They rather abandoned their candidates to get on with it on their own. It meant we had to generate our own energy. Given we took Kate’s percentage of vote to 66%, the other parties probably took the correct decision.
So we’re back again. We have the same team, we’ve had for the last two with Tom Ross in the Anthony McCaul role. It’s a winter election. I genuinely don’t have a problem with that. We do what we do and it’s the same for all parties. The political dynamics are different, but they always are. From the agent’s point of view it’s a logistical challenge as much as anything. I aim to come through it in one piece and so far, I have always managed to end the election with more friends than when I started including from the teams of other parties.