How to avoid Lib Dem by election batterings
July 19th, 2006
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What Labour and the Tories could do to defend themselves
Anybody with any doubt about the power of the Lib Dem by-election machine should check out the excellent “British Parliamentary By Elections Since 1945″ site where election literature from almost every campaign has been collected and is available to view on line.
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Quite simply the party is so far ahead in finding vote-switching messages and creating effective vehicles to communicate them that virtually every Tory and Labour seat in the country is vulnerable.
Just looking at the Bromley and Dunfermline material and you can understand why the party pulled off such spectacular performances. But is there anything that the big party duopoly could do to deal with the challenge? How do you avoid by election disasters at the hands of the Lib Dems? Here’s my four part guide.
1. Try to stop by elections in the first place. Don’t allow self-inflicted wounds like allowing MPs to take jobs that require them to resign. These are optional by elections which can land you in trouble. Also introduce strict health screening for prospective candidates in winnable seats and for those standing again. Provide advice and support so existing MPs can enjoy a healthier life-style.
2. Starve the Lib Dems of cash to fight campaigns. Looking through the by election site archives and it’s clear that the Lib Dems spend the maximum allowed expenses of £100,000 very effectively. So the Tories and Labour, as part of the election spending review that seems certain to follow the “cash for peerages” affair, could suggest a much lower limit. This could all be dressed up as “cleaning up” politics but in reality the objective would be to impede Ming Campbell’s party.
3. Choose candidates from the ethnic minorities. In the frenzied atmosphere of a by election they are likely to be less vulnerable to negative campaigning. The Lib Dems would find it harder to use messages like “a local man/woman for the job” for fear of being accused of running a racist campaign. Cynical - yes. Effective - probably.
4. Go negative right from the start. Labour’s successful defences at Birmingham Hodge Hill and Hartlepool in 2004 were based on highly effective negative attacks on the Lib Dem candidates. Research and find an aspect of their background that you can make into a campaign issue. Find a chink if their armour and go for it time and time again.
Because by elections provide the oxygen that drives the Lib Dems the party takes them very seriously. Much is run from a central unit that springs into action within hours of a by election becoming a possibility. Labour are quite good here but the Tories appear to be some way behind.
Will all this work? I don’t know - but when the next by election is called I’ll probably be betting on the Lib Dems.
Mike Smithson
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Excellent article, Mike. Plenty of food for thought. I am convinced that item 4 is (unfortunately) going to be necessary in future by-elections for the Conservatives - particularly where we are defending. The trick will be to find a way of going negative effectively, without overdoing it as seems to have happened at Cheadle.
Further to that, I think your last point is also very well taken. We need to develop the same sort of centralised by-election unit that clearly operates in Cowley Street. A Tory equivalent of Lord Rennard wouldn’t go amiss either. Personally, I think we should try to get Lynton Crosby back.
“The trick will be to find a way of going negative effectively, without overdoing it as seems to have happened at Cheadle.”
Perhaps the trick is to find and use real vulnerabilities, as in the case that the candidate is not local, not invite them, as suggesting that the Lib Dem candidate ia a rapist, when he clearly isn’t.
Of course there are vulnerabilities which shouldn’t be used against the opponent even if they are true, such as his or her ethnic background or sexual orientation, that kind of accusations may backfire.
“Invite” should obviously be “invent”. It seems it’s too early in the morning for me to write here.
2 - “Personally, I think we should try to get Lynton Crosby back.”
Perhaps Mike Smithson fancies a change of job…
I am sorry but there is something that seriously needs challenging here, and that is the idea that Birmingham Hodge Hill was some sort of triumph for Labour.
Places > England > West Midlands > Birmingham and Coventry > Birmingham Hodge Hill
Birmingham Hodge Hill
LABOUR HOLD - Liam Byrne
The 2005 general election
Votes Share
%
Liam Byrne, Labour 13,822 48.6
Nicola Davies, Liberal Democrat 8,373 29.5
Deborah Thomas, Conservative 3,768 13.3
Denis Adams, British National Party 1,445 5.1
Adrian Duffen, UK Independence Party 680 2.4
Azmat Begg, Peace and Progress Party 329 1.2
Labour majority: 5,449
Time of declaration: May 06 2005 04:31
Turnout: 52.7 %
2004 By-Election
Votes Share
%
Liam Byrne, Labour 7,451 36.5
Nicola Davies, Liberal Democrat 6,991 34.2
Stephen Eyre, Conservative 3,543 17.3
John Rees, Respect - the Unity Coalition 1,282 6.3
James William Starkey, National Front Protect Our Children’s Future 805 3.9
Mark Kenneth Wheatley, English Democrats 277 1.4
James George Hargreaves, Operation Christian Vote 90 0.4
Labour majority: 460
Time of declaration: July 16 2004 02:35
Turnout: 37.9 %
The 2001 general election
Votes Share
%
Terry Davis, Labour 16,901 63.9
Debbie Lewis, Conservative 5,283 20.0
Tracey O’Brien, Liberal Democrat 2,147 8.1
Lee Windridge, British National Party 889 3.4
Parwez Hussain, PJP 561 2.1
Dennis Cridge, Socialist Labour Party 284 1.1
Vivian Harvey, UK Independence Party 275 1.0
Ayub Khan, Muslim 125 0.5
Labour majority: 11,618
Time of declaration: June 08 2001 03:07
Turnout: 47.9 %
2004 By-Election
Votes Share
%
Liam Byrne, Labour 7,451 36.5
Nicola Davies, Liberal Democrat 6,991 34.2
Stephen Eyre, Conservative 3,543 17.3
John Rees, Respect - the Unity Coalition 1,282 6.3
James William Starkey, National Front Protect Our Children’s Future 805 3.9
Mark Kenneth Wheatley, English Democrats 277 1.4
James George Hargreaves, Operation Christian Vote 90 0.4
Labour majority: 460
Time of declaration: July 16 2004 02:35
Turnout: 37.9 %
Hartlepool was a bit better but hardly a result to be overly proud of.
Are you labouring under the delusion that the Tories lost the Bromley by-election? Because under the above standards it should be going down as a model of how the Tories should run a by-election! A vote share dropping by a mere 11% and a victory by a comfortable margin.
Oops, rather too many figures posted there.
Alex i think the point is that the Lib dems failed to win these seats. Close results simply dont give the Libs the publicity burst they need. The very aggressive Labour tactics ensured they held Hodge hill the night they lost leicester South and then held Hartlepool. Losses in either of the two would have been a disaster.
Another interesting question: why some Lib dem campaigns take off and others dont? Actually the Lib dems have a very mixed record in by-elections…what is it that causes some campaigns to “take off” and others to stall?
8 - did you see my last paragraph, mark?
Alex…sorry not used to this time in the morning:)
and my mind is full of what may happen in tommorows county council by election in llandrillo yn Rhos (Rhos on Sea)
Alex 6. In terms of the way it was reported July 15th 2004 was presented as a “score draw”. The Lib Dems won Leicester South but failed to take Birmingham Hodge Hill. The Labour PR machine managed this brilliantly.
Bromley was presented as a Tory disaster - the party machine handled it appallingly.
Perceptions not numbers are what matter.
LibDem by-election tactics that they all seem to have in common:
Spend money
Deliver leaflets
Organise your mutual aid well
Turn it into a two horse race
Use tabloid style newspapers
High profile through media
Use “third party” quotes
Effective use of web sites
I think the reason’s are more prosaic than your excellently colourful article suggests.
Few people are going to take the trouble vote for for the government in a by-election when they don’t need the seat. It’s not the British way to pat them on the back!
Similarly for the Tories. They might still have those who vote for them but few people like them. Not enough to give then a nod of encouragementit when it makes no difference anyway.
Which leaves the plucky little Lib Dems who everyone likes (as long as they don’t get enough seats to cause damage).
My God Roger, I think we almost agree. Only point I’d wade away from you is on the Tories - I don’t think they are universally hated in the way that you say. I think the LibDems do well at personality-not-politics and also the only-we-can-win-here syndrome. LibDems do “negative” very well without seeming too negative. Because of this, the LibDems always present themselves as challengers in a way that the Tories can’t.
Lib Dems do well when they are the “antipolitics”/”none of the above option”. You have to close this down. What unpopular choices will they make?
The difference between Labour’s literature in Brent East and in Hodge Hill/Hartlepool is stunning. Even as a Lib Dem, though, I think the attacks on Jody Dunn’s gaffe were justified - it was a pretty indefensible thing to say. There was also a chink in the armour at Hodge Hill - you can argue the rights and wrongs of phone masts, lack of evidence for harm etc, but if people responded to the attack I don’t blame them.
I’ll bet 99% of party political literature never gets looked at. The most voters will see of a campaign is local TV and posters in windows. And Orange is a better ‘call to action’ colour than blue.
That Liam Byrne is a pretty dodgy geezer. In my view the Lib Dems lost out in Hodge Hill by not going firmly negative on him.
17. Worst of all are the Labour posters in that horrible, heavy, trendy late-90s typeface. Every time I look at it it reminds me of what I dislike about Labour - the heavy-handedness and forced conformity and the rictus smiles. The brick-shaped
new Labour
new Britain is the worst.
I think that all parties use pretty low tactics in by-elections. The reasons the other two parties have such a go at the Lib Dems is that the Lib Dems have a more effective by-election machine, bussing in people from all over turning a constituency, if targeted into a sea of orange.
Bromley was a surprisingly good result. I judge whether or not a seat is targeted by whether I get a begging letter for money from the party or not. There were begging letters for Romsey, Dunfermline, Leicester South, Birm HH, Brent E. There was no begging letter for Bromley or Livingstone. So I don’t think these were identified as winnable at the outset; in hindsight Bromley was winnable.
In terms of “low tactics” anything the Lib Dems have done in recent years is no worse than implying the Lib Dem in Cheadle was a criminal, or that Jody Dunn is a friend of criminals. (For that matter, Cherie Blair, as a lawyer is just aa much a friend of criminals on occasions.) In fact these were crasser and more transparent as rubbishing other candidates; Lib Dem tactics are more subtle than this. There is often a strong emphasis on localism.
All the proposals so far to tackle the Lib Dems at by-election lack imagination ………… some more useful ideas :
1. Ban Lib Dems under the new Glorification of By-Elections Act.
2. Despatch Lord Rennard to Belmarsh on the death of any MP.
3. Deceased MP’s to be considered “alive” for parliamentary purposes until the dissolution of parliament and stuffed MP’s wheeled through on the nod during divisions.
4. Close down all veggie restaurants in by-election seats. Quiche and lentils to be banned in supermarkets.
5. Introduce “pass laws” restricting Lib Dems to their own streets.
6. Introduce French “burka laws” on the wearing of sandals.
7. Merge the Lib Dems with the Conservatives !! … who’d presently notice the difference !!
8. Send foreign policy expert Ming on a 4 year fact finding visit to the Middle east.
19 - yes, they strike me as an attempt at “authoritarianism with a human face”. Those happy peasants delivering another bumper stack of leaflets this year. The beloved leader. It brings to mind socialism realism art of the Stalinist era.
Off topic:
Time and time again we are hearing the BBC use John Reid’s phrase “not fit for purpose” to describe the Home Office.
Except it is not Reid’s phrase. It was a couple of months ago that Ming asked in PMQs “Is the Home Office fit for purpose?”
Of course, Ming screwed up the delivery, by sitting down, standing up again, and then repeating the question, and Blair, amid laughter, rubbished it. But, with the latest news of lack of controls in the system, it looks as if the old geezer had a point that the new Home Sec agrees with.
Plenty for the tories to learn. But when Mr Maude said after the B & C shambles ‘I don’t think we should get involved in this sort of negative campaigning’, its apparent that they are not interested in learning.
In one sense, these bye-election successes for the LDs don’t matter. But the tories know that the LDs will defend their marginal seats at the next GE as a series of bye-elections. A sharper political operator than DC would be putting his own Rennard/A Campbell (and teams) in place as a matter of urgency.
“but when the next by election is called I’ll probably be betting on the Lib Dems.”
well, maybe it’s better to wait to see where (if) it’ll happen. I wouldn’t bet on the Libdems winning Na h-Eileanan an Iar, even in a by election.
Btw, Kate Hoey seems headed for troubles with a couple of CLPs asking to take actions against her because she’s chairing an organization aimed to unseat Lab MPs.
http://www.labourhome.org/story/2006/7/19/85136/3426
24. It was a sensible thing to say. You can’t certainly go on TV saying that you’ll find a dirty campaigns. Then what you do is a different thing. Even the Libdems claim to run positive campaigns. Even Lambeth Labour said they run a positive campaign (even if the opponents claim the opposite)
Na h-Eileanan an Iar - yes, I think the Lib Dems would not even come close here.
Rather difficult to bus in hundreds of activists for the weekend. And rather a low base to start from.
27. And I suppose they don’t know Gaelic well enough
20 I agree that the Emails put out by Lord R did not indicate that he thought anything better than a decent 2nd place was achievable in Bromley . I suspect he is probably wishing he had been rather more optimistic in his campaign .
Apart from attacking weaknesses in other party’s candidates and policies , it is essential to be prepared for their attacks on yours and react quickly and strongly to counter them . I think this was a weakness in Hartlepools where the Labour attacks on Jody Dunn could have been turned round to her benefit . The Conservatives in Bromley had no answer to the 3/4 job Bob charges partly of course because they were true .
I can forsee a future Lib Dem campaign portraying the Conservatives as an extreme right wing little England party wishing to break up the Union and leave the EU threatening the jobs of people working in industries that depend on exports to Europe . There are numerous quotes ready to be used on sites such as Conservativehome to “prove” that is true .
17. “I’ll bet 99% of party political literature never gets looked at.”
Roger, the Lib Dems must be paying you to propgate this sophistry!
18. As for Liam Byrne, you are totally right. Think of Hilary Armstrong with her hair all fallen out and the charisma taken away and you are not far off the mark. It should be treated as a by-election equivalent of a war-crime to have allowed this little &*^$ into the House. But the Lib Dems literature there was not as good as in Leicester South on the same day and the ‘Respect’ kids were up to all sorts of tricks preventing the most effective squeeze.
It is amazing really what by-election luck does. If it were not for the fall out between Libs and Owenites, Hague for instance would have been blitzed into oblivion in Richmond. I wonder where (and when) he might have turned up. Possibly leader now if he’d started his MP career a bit later.
20. I think that’s the difference. Attacking Jody Dunn for saying something disparaging about prospective constituents = fair enough. Calling her a friend of criminals for defending criminal suspects = out of order.
30 - agree with your comment on Hague. It is interesting when people get elected “too early”. Had Stephen Twigg come a creditable second to Portillo in 1997, he would have been given a nice safe seat in 2001. He would now be in the Cabinet.
Had Nicol Stephen not inexplicably been beaten in Kincardine in the 1992 GE, having won the by-election in the marginal seat in 1991 easily, he would be a senior Lib Dem figure in Westminster, not deputy first minister of Scotland.
Had David Mellor held his seat in 1997, he would be a backbencher.
Time and time again we are hearing the BBC use John Reid’s phrase “not fit for purpose” to describe the Home Office.
Except it is not Reid’s phrase. It was a couple of months ago that Ming asked in PMQs “Is the Home Office fit for purpose?”
Ming did say it first (on May 3), but Reid did use the phrase himself in from of the Home Affairs Committee on May 22
However, I want to be straight with the Committee today and honest with you because I believe that, despite these advances, in the wake of the problems of mass migration that we have been facing our system is not fit for purpose.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmselect/cmhaff/uc775-ix/uc77502.htm
I’ve just gone to the site you mentioned above to see the literature from Bromley. It’s interesting. The Lib Dems stuff looks horribly designed with far too much information on all pages-but it looks energetic. And if no-one reads it but just glances you’re left with the impression of energy and ideas and a party on a budget. No fancy designers here!
Their newspaper mock-ups are particularly clever in that all their basaic campaign themes are there as tabloid headlines. “3 JOBS BOB”- “2 HORSE RACE”. I wouldn’t have realized they were Lib/Dem leaflets. Clever stuff.
The Tory leaflets were more predictable and better designed so probably more easily ignored. Lots of blue and lots of pictures of the candidate. The Lib dems had many fewer pictures of the candidate but used his name more and in much bolder type. Probably more important to remember the name than the face? The other theme that came over from the Tory leaflets was patriotism and the English flag. The candidate was upright with distinguished grey hair. And so was their literature. I was surprised that the Candidate had himself photographed with a shopper who looked at least six inches bigger than him. candidates don’t usually advertise the fact that they’re short.
UKIP was dark purple. A colour that reminds some of a long time ago and others it makes feel sick. Rather like the party. Everything neatly laid out. Everything boxed. The design like the colour looked like something from the ’50’s. A neat shot of Farage,his party name above, his name below. Definately not a party for women-nothing feminine about it-and not a party for anyone who doesn’t starch their shirts!
Labour was safe and warmish but quite unmemorable. Friendly uncluttered design which looked safe and worthy but not new or exciting
33 - More capital should be made of this. It’s a bit late now, as I think we have understudies at PMQs today. But a question like:-
“The Home Secretary now admits the HO is not fit for purpose? Has the PM changed his opinion on this since 3 May?”
Liam Byrne was protrayed as some New Labour guru - a man from business. But he had been part of the Hewitt team at Anderson´s before a spell as an advisor in government (on secondment, I believe). Last of all he made a lot of money selling american IT to …the government.
Liam Byrne is a pretty decent bloke and a cracking campaigning constituency MP. RESPECT didn’t cost the LDs the by-election there, that was down to their appalling choice of candidate - an apologist for the mobile phone industry whose job it was to persuade councils to let masts appear wherever the companies wanted - a candidate whose day job directly opposed LD campaigns across the country and in Birmingham.
I was on the ground in Hodge Hill and it was closely fought, but we won it. Nokia was defeated by precisely those tactics that usually benefit the LDs.
32. Twiggy can find a seat next time. But I think you’re right about his career.
I think Alex is right to point out that Hodge Hill was only a relative success for Labour and the swing was grim, so one needs to be wary of portraying it as a model - if the seat had been less safe to start with we’d have lost on that swing. One needs to bear in mind the need to avoid disillusioning supporters if the message is too overwhelmingly negative. I spent a great deal of time helping in the Leicester South by-election, and some of the leaflets I saw (not only one party was to blame) were frankly disgusting - just abusive rubbish which would have put off most sensible people from voting at all. I’m a hardened campaigner with 50 years on the doorstep, but if I had to put out stuff like that all the time I’d go back to computing.
Anecdote time…I did enjoy one moment, though. The LibDem candidate was Asian-born, running against Peter Soulsby. I ran into one of those Labour-BNP floater types on the doorstep. He clearly hadn’t taken in any details about the candidates, but: “I’ve always voted Labour, but I’m not gonna vote for you this time, you’re all over them ethnic minorities.” I didn’t say a word, just smiled cryptically and walked off. When the LibDems won, the only consolation was the thought of him grinding his teeth as he discovered who his new MP was. With luck he’s emigrated.
[31] Valeire wrote calling Jody Dunn a friend of criminals for defending criminal suspects = out of order - indeed, but an effective dog-whistle for those who didn’t want their next MP to be a lawyer of any sort…
How did the big 2001-2005 by-elections fare in the subsequent GE e.g. Hodge Hill, Leicester South and Hartlepool?
41. Do you mean in terms of results?
GE results (comparison with byelection):
Hodge Hill:
Lab 48.6% (+12.1)
LD 29.5% (-4.7)
Hartlepool:
Lab 51.5% (+10.8)
LD 30.4% (-3.8)
Leicester South
Lab 39.3% (+10)
LD 30.6% (-4.3)
Brent East:
LD 47.5% (+8.38)
Lab 38.8% (+5.04%)
I haven’t helped in a by-election since 1990, so have probably got all this wrong, but aren’t the priorities in this order…
1) Get your own vote out. Use canvass returns (if available). This is more important if you had a big vote last time. Just go and find these people and frogmarch them to the polling station. Many of them never vote against you, but you must get them to vote.
2) Try to stop your main competitor getting their vote out. Campaign negatively, and rubbish the main opposition. Perhaps you’ll turn some of these people off politics altogether and they won’t vote at all. That’s fine as it means fewer votes against you. There were plenty of stay at home Tories in Bromley.
3) Squeeze the opposition. Two horse race. Lend us your vote as you’d rather have us than them.
4) Find an issue to send a message to the country. Whether it’s “Thatcher out” (Eastbourne 1990); “End the poll tax” (Ribble Valley 1991) “Labour is loony” (Bermondsey 1982); “Stop the war” (Leicster South 2004).
5) Lastly, a few positive messages on the candidate, and some local issues - hospitals are always good, as is transport.
21. Jack W - nice one.
37 Take a lead from Nick Palmer and post under your real name , Liam .
Just an observation: Labour run their most negative campaigns against female candidates. Perhaps the real dog whistle is “a woman should not have a good job.”
46. Or maybe your female candidates are just more gaffes prone and so easy to attack.
Mike Weatherly is the Tory candidate in Hove according to ConHome.
He stood in Pavillion last time, he’s a Crawleyt councillor and he wasn’t on the A List
Interesting discussion about Birmingham Hodge Hill. I was active in the campaign and it was obviously not a stunning victory for Labour and given another week Nicola would have won. There were many reasons why Labour held the seat - one is at http://colin-ross.org.uk/news/9.html
The 2005 result was a very good result for the LibDems there (again I was involved) with limited work.
The boundary changes for the seat are VERY interesting with the addition of Bordesley Green which has two Liberal Democrat Councillors out of three. The results for the constituency on the new boundaries from the 2006 local elections, which Alex didn’t give/have were:
Labour 42.7%
Lib Dem 32.7%
Conservative 8.7%
BNP 11.0%
Green 3.1%
Other (UKIP?) 1.8%
Colin
45. Pot and Kettle??
49. I think that if Labour is ahead by 10% even in the locals, they should hold comfortably in a GE.
50 - I do post under my real name LOL
Are there any cases where a seat was just retained in a by-election, only to be lost in a General Election? Or where a seat has changed hands in a by-election, has the majority in terms of percent increased at a subsequent GE?
If not, then by-elections will almost always represent a high-water mark for a challenger.
53. “Or where a seat has changed hands in a by-election, has the majority in terms of percent increased at a subsequent GE? ”
Theater increased her majority in BE
53 - Brent East? Think Teather managed to increase her majority at the GE. Also, how long do you go for… Southwark N & Bermondsey is now a Lib Dem stronghold, but not sure how the elections have gone since the by as to how it got there.
53. Darlington 1983. Labour hold in March, gained by the Tories in June.
55.”Southwark N & Bermondsey is now a Lib Dem stronghold, but not sure how the elections have gone since the by as to how it got there.”
Byelection: 27.2%
1983: 15%
1987: 7.7%
1992: 26.1%
1997: 8.3%
2001: 26.2%
2005: 14.3%
so up and down all over the years.
56. Kevin, do you sometimes post by chance on LabourHome?
56. were the boundaries the same?
Interesting article Mike.
Personaly I don’t like negative campaigning, and would prefere it if we kept ammunition for when we needed it, and had covered the bases with rebutals of all bad news before the start of the campaign.
53 - Yes, Ossie O’Brien retained Darlinton for Labour in the March 1983 by-election only to lose the seat a few weeks later in the June General.
58. Probably not - the boundary changes in 1983 took account of the changes in the county boundaries after the 1974 local government reorganisation, so there were some major changes. I’ll have a look.
Brent East: good point!
Darlington: special case, as it was seen by many as 3 way fight in by-election (as followed just after Bermondsey); Alliance did surprisingly badly in by-election and were probably squeezed by Tories in GE.
62 - Hmmm, is there ever a by-election which isn’t a “special case”?
OT. I must say that giving up ones slavish support for a particular party is quite liberating. I strongly recommend it. Yesterday I might have been prepared to change my mind if Margaret Beckett had said nothing but to-day even her head on tower bridge wouldn’t be enough.
Free at last! Free at last! Thank God almighty I’m free at last!
61. According to the Times Guide, Darlington’s boundaries were unchanged between 1979 and 1983.
57. Andrea, no I haven’t posted there yet.
65. Thanks Kevin. I had a Kevin having a sort of go at me there and I wondered if it was you.
RE 64, Roger, What did Becket say that upset you so?
65: Since the BOPCRIS website doesn’t seem willing to give me any page scans today I can’t read the boundary commission report, so I can only assume that you’re right and there weren’t!
64 - had Mark Oaten or Simon Hughes become Liberal Democrat leader, I would have resigned immediately. Had Kennedy stayed much longer and the party continued as a policy-light crowdpleaser, I would not have renewed by membership. After the GE, when I got begging letters etc from the LDs, I sent them back saying “no donation till there is a leadership change.” I said the same with begging phone calls.
Under Ming, I will hang on. There are some good policies coming out now - for the first time in about 15 years, and a bit of edge. Not sure about today’s announcement “Life should mean for life.” Haven’t scrutinised it yet, but the rhetoric is Oaten’s tough liberalism.
I should be saying “Join us” to Roger, but I lack the preachiness to be bothered to. Enjoy your freedom; I came close to freedom but remain on the inside.
69 “on the inside” - albeit of another political prison.
53. As I’ve posted elsewhere, it’s only happened 4 times since the war.
South Down 1986(be) UUP hold, 1987 SDLP gain
Darlington 1983(be) Lab hold, 1983 Con gain
Dundee E 1973(be) Lab hold, 1974F SNP gain
Bolton E 1960(be) Con hold, 1964 Lab gain
The Lib Dems have never achieved it. The closest they came was…
Colne Valley 1963(be) Lab hold, 1964 Lab hold, 1966 Lib gain
I suppose a lot of this depends on how you define ’success’.
I think I am right in saying that the swing against the Tories in Bromley was lower than the swings against Labour in Hodge Hill and Hartlepool? So we don’t really know if Labour’s negative tactics worked. Labour used equally negative tactics in Leicester South - some pretty nasty racist stuff in fact - but still lost.
Yet again we have the dreadful sight of people talking about negative campaigning as a laudable activity. Come back to reality - it is not, it is a cancer on the body politic and those who indulge in it are responsible for the destruction of politics in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
Fight elections on policies and on what you would *do*, even (if you can) on your record.
Rather than fighting a negative campaign with a negative campaign attack the negativity and provide an altenative. In an age where parties are aping each other to win the votes thnat are left you are slipping inexorably into the abyss by not just aping policies but aping tactics.
Regarding Mike’s other points I don’t see anything wrong with slashing the expenditure limit, it fits in with the need for parties to rein in their spending (and attempt to extort it from taxes at your peril) and such profligacy is borderline immoral.
That I vote lib dem at elections at the moment is probably because the national picture is the one which enters my consciousness, if I had to vote after enduring the rubbish that by elections now produce I would do what many obviously do and abstain. I’m not one to be conned.
The more that activists delight in how they destroy others the more people despise the activists. Winning should not be at any cost.
37 - so basically does a perfectly normal job which is completely within the law? If you oppose these masts shouldn’t you be campaigning for the (Labour) Government to change them rather than attacking a Lib Dem candidate?
42 -
“2) Try to stop your main competitor getting their vote out. Campaign negatively, and rubbish the main opposition. Perhaps you’ll turn some of these people off politics altogether and they won’t vote at all. That’s fine as it means fewer votes against you. There were plenty of stay at home Tories in Bromley.”
How can anyone read that and feel proud?
67. She said Israel’s destruction of Lebanon was “Quite understandable” and she would not ask them to stop firing……..I have too many friends there to hear that and anyway the destruction of any country is NOT understandable particularly one which has tried as hard as Lebanon. I shot an award winning commercial for them called “Environment” Everyone gave of their time for free and the passion these people had for rebuilding the country after their civil wars was quite humbling.
75 - nobody says it’s right. It’s pretty disgusting actually. But it’s what all parties do. And when done effectively, unfortunately it works. So how can it be stopped?
Don’t forget to tune in for Prescott’s questions on BBC Parliament now.
75 ukpaul. You’ll never stop negative campaigning and in some ways nor should you. In Bromley the Tories selected a worthy but easily attackable candidate. The 3 Jobs Bob attack was negative but had a element of truth and resonated with the public. Should the Lib Dems have held back ? IMO no.
Also, we the public should be too hypocritical about negative campaigning. Most like a juicy fight with the candidates mud wrestling in the gutter ….. thongs optional !
77 - I’m afraid that ‘it works’ is no excuse, neither is that ‘all sides do it to some degree’. For one you can contact your parties leadership and say that, if it continues, you will cease your membership. Anyone who doesn’t do something similar is, to my mind, complicit in that sort of activity.
As neither a member or activist of any political pary I don’t have that power. I don’t count in the eyes of parties until they solicit my vote so my complaint can only reside in my words here today.
On the by-election runner up going on to win the seat - Chesterfield is a good example - although it took 3 general elections for the Lib Dems to take the seat.
UKPaul. It seems you miss the sublety of campaigning. Take the trouble to look at the leaflets from Bromley and you’ll see something much more multi faceted than just positive versus negative campaigning. The secret is to get over several messages. Some about the candidate some about the policies and some about the opposing candidate and their policies. All quite reasonable things to do and having looked at the leaflets from that campaign most done with a sureness of touch that M&S would be proud of.
“For Brutus was an honorable man….” an early example of negative campaigning.
The most effective way of impeding the Lib Dem by election machine is to adopt my point 2 above. The current by election expenses limit is £100,000 - in a General Election the maximum is each seat is is just over £7,000 in a county seat plus 7p for each elector. That makes a maximum of little more than £12,000.
Bringing the two figures into line - which on the face of it sounds entirely reasonable - could reduce the amount of Lib Dem literature by seven-eights.
i can see some horse-trading on this when the parties are discussing the funding of political parties.
82 - I certainly do understand the difference between what is intended and how it is communicated. No party will ever admit that it is being primarily negative and the subtlety you refer to cannot fail to be there given the nature of a campaign. This does not change, however, the underlying and often unspoken attitude.
I’d be very interested in seeing figures regarding who has abstained in by elections and why, but I doubt that that sort of study exists.
73 ukpaul I agree with you entirely. The Lib Dems here in Colchester are masters of all things negative…..and that’s about it. It was one of the reasons why the turnout here in the GE was so low. It would make a refreshing change for the Lib Dems to campaign on the benefits of their candidates and policies rather than constantly slinging mud at the opposition.
Again, I do not mean to justify negative campaigning by parties, but the media are dreadful at it. Look at the Sun in 1992 “Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?”. The tabloid press are just as bad.
Isn’t Ed Balls an unpleasent character. Sounds like a smug sixth former. Surely he can’t be a future chancellor!!
87 - yes, not like that lovely George Osborne. So mature, real gravitas, nothing smug… fine Chancellor he will be!
86 - My contempt for Mr Murdoch knows no bounds so I can only agree!
(My comments also apply to all parties, wherever and whenever they fit).
85 Camulodunum. Turnout in Colchester has followed national trends since Roman times …. indeed in the last election it improved by 1.5% …… so you can’t blame Roberticus Russellia for that one.
88 - is there anywhere one can bet on the next Shadow Chancellor? - surely there’ll be a change in a year or so.
Not exactly sure what you mean by negative campaigning (playing the [wo]man and not the ball?). I would say comparing and contrasting your party/ candidate with the other party candidate was not only reasonable but absolutely mandatory in a democracy. I wouldn’t want anyone to hold back from saying the things they honestly believe to be true.
What I’m sure many people on this site find utterly depressing is when you talk to people who have no idea of a party’s policy which affects them substnatially and still vote the illogical way - even if it is for you.
I have no particularly problem with eg Labour pointing out the Huntley votes policy. On the other hand my Labour opponent said I opposed something which I explicitly did not - using taxpayer’s money to do it as well. That I think was negative and should not have happened.
It is very difficult to do a qualitative analysis of something if not in comparison with something or someone else. Even “We have the cheapest prices” is negative to those who dont.
91 - Not that I know of. Obviously Betfair has the next Chancellor market.
Re Roger at 76, Did she realy say that? Umm… I think our foreign policy is going barking mad.
93 - But that is a positive message, ‘their prices are inflated’ is not. To take an electoral example, stating that your candidate lives in the constituency is fine but leading with the other candidates not doing so is negative. It’s a fine line but usually it is a line.
I think the wheels have rather come off our foreign policy since Iraq went so spectacularly wrong. I think I have been right in saying more people have been killed in Iraq than Lebanon this past week which is saying something, and something truly awful at that.
Althought not a fan of Chirac in general he at least said what I believe to be true about the Israeli action, which is more than anyone else has.
Campbell asking exactly the right question on the middle east. This is a time where he should shine, the governments toadying to the US in allowing Israel time to bomb Lebanon is unconscionable.
I don’t think the trick is just in being negative - look at what happened to the Conservative campaign in Cheadle. It’s about convincing the public that you are on their side and share their ideas and aspirations. (I thought that the ‘Are you thinking what we’re thinking?’ slogan from the Tories last year could have been a big winner)
We seem to catpure the mood well, and are relentless at getting our message home through well-presented and enthusiastically delivered leaflets.
And maybe, just maybe, that in a single consitituency election people actually like what the Lib Dems say and how they conduct themselves. In a general election, voters want to select a government, but in a by-election voters go with who they most want representing them.
99 - I think by elections are increasingly seen as (or have they always been) a way of punishing the incumbent party, sometimes nationally sometimes locally. I’d like to think that wasn’t the case but the sort of campaigns run only reinforce that view.
97. Pretty clear, I think, whose side Chirac would have been on in ‘l’affaire Dreyfus’.
88 My Boss (a complete and total Tory) came back from a lunch with Ed Balls a few days ago and was completely overwhelmed by him - his confidence, his competence and his technocratic mastery of his brief. I confess I was surprised.
Excellent summertime fun in the Commons - Prescott and a Tory MP being ticked off by the Speaker during DPMQs, Cameron and Blair gleefully biffing one another over the former’s policies to date and the latter’s recent series of climbdowns. Top stuff.
92. Yes. Pointing out your opponent’s flaws is a vital part of a healthy democracy. The line is between honest and dishonest, not ‘positive’ and ‘negative.’
102. Probably is when he’s not being countered.
102. Ed Balls is certainly no fool. His flaws are rather personal and political.
[99] “Negative” is a simpler message to sell compared to actually putting forward a complicated platform, we are reduced to “They are bad” and it raises far less questions than actually saying somthing positive- hence the temptation to go negative in the first place. However, as we know, going negative does carry plenty of risks. Not least because you can make yourself look totally negative by doing so, so the key thing is balance.
The irony is that the Lib Dems actually have a relatively sophisticated message in their core principles - Socialism is dead and Conservatism (in the Cornerstone sense) is pretty unpopular. So when Lib Dems are taken seriously they can do a whole lot better. So Mike (Yo Smithson) is right- going negative early on the Lib Dems can work.
I think Mike’s point 2 is a red herring. The by-election spending limits were increased in the mid 1990s (after Mid Staffs) I believe. Most of the Liberals/Lib Dem historical by-election victories have been on the basis of spending the same as at General Elections. The key is getting bodies on the ground (which is free).
I also think UKPaul is talking nonsense. It is a vital part of democracy for politicians policy positions to be exposed. The attcks on Nichola Davies were legitimate, because they were about a potential conflict of interest. Questionning Bob Neil’s commitment to do the job is legitimate as he clearly has his snout in a number of troughs that he is unable to do the job as MP on full time basis (which is the basis on which the election is being fought).
If al parties simply staked out their policy positions then we would be doing democracy a disservice - no exposure of corruption (Aitken, Hamilton etc) and no ability to compare the qualities of the persons putting themselves forward.
If you think politics is unduly negative now - try the 19th century - things are far cleaner now.
I do accept however there is a divide between negative campaigning and nasty campaigning. Nasty campaigning is to attack people for who they are not what they’ve done. I could point to the differences in the way Labour treated Charles Anglin in Lambeth as an example of nasty campaigning - not about either his record or his policies. You might wish to compare that to how Chris Bryant MP was treated by his opponents.
108 Dan. Frankly the way Chris Bryant was treated was just pants !
108 and 109, How was he treated?
Ed Balls was president of the student body when I was an undergraduate. I also found him impressive though he was rather more left wing then…
110. IIRC Labour posted on their website a copy of the the local paper piece about him and his pics on gaydar.
There was also a brief comment with a sort of joke about it.
I didn’t think it was Gaydar though I’m sure he will set you straight if I am correct.
113. Jon, it was:
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-1335.html
96 - I don’t think it’s a straight forward as that though. To tak ethe example given, if your opponent (of any party) comes from the other end of the country, has never previously shown any interest in the area, and is simply looking for a seat in parliament, isn’t it reasonable that the voters should know that? Your opponent is hardly going to publicise the fact themselves. Of course, it’s not usually as clear cut as that, and you can certainly argue as to what is reasonable and what unreasonable in specific cases, but I don’t think it’s reasonable to suggest that a candidate should never mention anything about their opponents.
To use another example, our local MP in the mid 1990s was severely criticised in the investigations into the “cash for questions” affair. Are we really suggesting that both Labour and the Lib Dems were wrong to refer to this in their general election campaigns?
Had the Rhondda been a marginal or had their been a by-election then I suspect that opponents would have made an issue of the prospective MP posting pictures of himself on the internet in his y-fronts.
[83] Our Genial Host is playing the faux naïf - by-elections used to have the same expenses limits as general elections, and all the Parties ignored them and agents’ returns were works of speculative fiction.
Never argue with Andrea ! My apologies.
118. Jon, nah, no problem.
Maybe the media got it wrong at the time though. I didn’t check gaydar
116. Max, but he’s versatile!
I can picture the leaflets though:
Versatile MP in fashion outrage!
Sort of off thread but an interesting summary of the electoral commissions returns for 2005:
Labour:
2005 losses: £14.5m
Total net liabilities: £27.25m
Conservatives:
2005 losses: £15m
Total net liabilities: £18m
Lib Dems:
2005 losses: £207,000
Total net assets: £298,000
I would have thought that any reduction in by-election spending limits would be driven by poverty on behalf of both Labour and Conservatives rather than trying to stop the Lib Dems!
82 - Yes - it is difficult to simply describe something as ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ - they are often flip sides of the same issue.
Is it positive or negative to be against cuts to the local NHS? On the one hand it is a negative attack on the party that is responsible for the cuts, on the other it will be seen as an overwhelmingly positive stance by the majority of local residents.
120 - Indeed - just the interest on Labour’s debt would pay for about 20 by-election campaigns!
Labour members must be delighted at the prospect of all the cheese and wine evenings and jumble sales they will have to organise to pay off that debt
122. How many money can they get with events like this?
http://www.hebdenbridge.co.uk/news/news05/55.html
123 - Had tea at Alice’s house once. Lovely lady!
122 > wine and cheese evenings
22 - It’s quite simple. All they need are a few wealthy supporters to loan them some money for a while.
Surprised no-one’s thought of that before.
I’ve had people say to me on the doorstep that they are voting for xxxxx (Lib Dem candidate) because, ’she seems a nice lady’ and they do get their leaflet delivered all the time.
At a very local level, it is this image that they are living on, backed up by regular Focus newsletters that suggest and imply all the good work they are doing. They will make sure that they offer a broad appeal to as many people as possible - even, in some cases, if national Lib Dem policy goes against the issues at hand.
BUT… come the election, all of sudden the well used and effective tactics come in to play. Hand written evelopes, Dear Neighbour letters, Straight choice between ‘Hard working all year round Lib Dems’ unlike the opposition, two horse race, too close to call, every vote counts, xxx can’t win here and the bar charts / quotes rubbishing the oppostion chosing whatever combination is required from whatever source…
Then after it’s all over, it’s back to the warm fuzzy messages until the next time…
There is a way to beat them though:-
Push them into a corner and draw them into a fight all year round. Under no circumstance do you allow them to purely roll out the standard three week campaign every election. Don’t let them settle at any point. Keep setting the agenda and make them react.
This requires someone or a local team who are willing to bust a gut to win - all year round. Unfortunatly this is the hardest part. Who will be prepared to put in two, three years graft for no guarantee result or reward to crack a Lib Dem stronghold?
So, the bottom line is that, personally, I have no problem with pointing out lies, mis-truth, dubious statements, lack of action on an issue, incompetence etc against any party, but especially against the Liberals as that’s my local battle. They have made a couple of mistakes locally that I can now hammer home again and again from now to May 2007.
You get them to make mistakes by working hard against them, otherwise they do and say what they want without any pressure to actually do anything.
I would expect nothing less in return, but try very, very hard not to give them anything to attack - which they will again and again if you offer it to them.
All of that balanced with positive action / ideas and policies from my side.
That isn’t negative campaigning, it’s politics.
Matt.
SSP soap opera episode 173:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/glasgow_and_west/5194588.stm
Allan Green, the SSP’s national secretary, tells the court that Sheridan confessed in a party meeting that he visited swingers clubs.
Everyone was shocked and no-one supported the libel action (well, they had a point!)
Why are the LDs such effective by-election / general election campaigners?
Part of the reason is the first past the post electoral system is so biased against them.
If the LDs could go into a General Election with a confidence that if they managed to get 20% of the votes then they would have 100+ MPs: would they have needed to become such effective campaigners?
Which is most important for the LDs: Campaigning skills or “policy”?
The bitter experience of General Elections with lots of votes but next to no seats must have impacted they way the LDs think.
It would be good for politics in this country if the LDs were rewarded (with MPs) for putting forward well thought out policies and ideas. Personally I much favour positive rather than negative campaigning.
However the reality is that winning seats is what counts – who can blame the LDs for realising that policy is of secondary importance to campaigning skills.
LDs seem to moan much less about the electoral system than they used to. They are adapting and learning how to win under the first past the post system.
This may be good news for the LDs but it’s not good news for politics in this country. The LDs are more and more seen as negative campaigners. The way politics is perceived is changing – respect for politicians and the political process is continuing to decline.
(I really really really don’t like the Tories, I don’t like Labour and I’m not that keen on the LDs either)
08 - Dan that was not the point at all, you have misread it completely. To attack policies is fine, to find corruption is fine. To attack someone because of where they live is not, to infer that their policies will do something they won’t is not.
Valerie is partly right in that this is about honesty and dishonesty but I would add to that by saying that personal attacks are also to be deplored, attack a policy and compare it with the positives of your own don’t denigrate an opponent and misrepresent their intent.
People in this political bubble don’t seem to be able to understand the effect that they are having, that they are part of the problem that democracy is now facing and, if they don’t address their own ways, then we are in for a very shaky time.
I think I know who talks nonsense and it’s pretty much party activists of all stripes.
Matt at 127. Great post, I agree with every word.
130 - take an example at random.
Eastbourne - 1990
LD David Belotti was very much “the local man” - OK, he was from down the road in Brighton.
Conservative - Richard Hickmett was MP for Scunthorpe but had lost his seat in 1987.
Is it fair game to use a line like “Who would you prefer, local man or the ex-MP for Scunthorpe?” This is fair enough in my book, but it is the limit of my tastes. It is a line that will be used against Tory A-listers parachuted in come the next election.
(As the LDs are now starting to parachute in people to seats already held, - like Clegg and Huhne - will other parties use the same tactics?)
83. Although LDs spend liberally in by-elections, the party is talented at campaigning on low budgets, unlike their more heavily indebted opponents. So maybe reducing the limits wouldn’t damage them as much as Mike implies. See this posting from a Lib Dem blogger today:
“The local Tories … thought they had us too when our accounts didn’t turn up on the Commission website. They are gobsmacked to find that we won control of MK Council and have clung on to effective power (even in NOC) with a yearly Local Party turnover of under £25,000 so don’t have to have our accounts on public access. They simply cannot get their heads around this level of frugality.”
http://politsmk.blogspot.com/2006/07/drunken-sailors-at-helm.html
Roger, after your posts of the last few days, what is it that prevents you becoming a LibDem? Your case is interesting, because you are one of the last Labour followers on PB and now you have joined the ranks of former Labour followers of PB. You strike me as a typical kind of Labour guy, and your move now could indicate a considerable loss of support if Blair’s “Ariel Sharon” impression goes on longer…
A few years ago in Befordshire we were fighting a council by election in some villages where we had absolutely no members or known supporters. We brought in a candidate from a few miles away and campaigned with the slogan - “Alan S has no financial or property interests in the ward making it sound as though there were dirty goings on with the Tory candidate.
It worked brilliantly and as I recall we came from zero to within 27 votes of victory squeezing Labour on the way.
135. That’s a classic example of dirty Libdem campaign!
One thing is saying that the opponent is not local or has too many jobs, another thing is suggesting that there were “dirty goings on with the Tory candidate” when there aren’t.
That’s exactly why I tend not to like the Libdems. They’re those subtle suggestion they like to do and they’re so proud of that irritate me.
130. SBS, you mean like Damien ‘the Alien’ dive-bombing Folkestone post-Drac? (Cue humour-devoid ranting Tory from South west London)
39 Nick P 50 years on the doorstep?!?! I trust you will be running a case in the European Courts against the Labour Party for child abuse/exploitation? Get Cherie on your side and put the old comrades club even more millions in hock to the rich luvvies and US crap-IT suppliers!
76. Roger, Yes Maggie B clearly had to sign up to the Condi-Jack Covenant of Newt Gingrich in order to be granted her new high perch - with probably a free caravaning holiday tour of the Negev thrown in. “These, children, are the GOOD terrorists… and these are the nasty ones with towels on their heads.”
81 Dan, Chesterfield was another example of a campaign which was there for the taking, but with totally the wrong candidate, creating a ‘glass ceiling’ for the campaign. Probably would have been lost back a-la-Leicester rather than the prolonged build-up to where they are now. Tony Benn would have become a full-time TV performer and we might have been spared Wotten Wossy!
136. That is something I indeed wouldn’t be proud of.
135 Mike Rennard.
Disgraceful !!
In the GE in the constituency where I live, there were some very nasty leaflets going around. I was not very involved, but it looked dirty. Of the three main parties, one candidate had lost a libel case to the neighbouring MP, one had 2 convictions for indecency, and one was not local and described as “obscure”. The material of all three parties was fairly depressingingly personal.
It is now a three way marginal - let’s hope it’s more issue driven next time. I would say that all three parties crossed the threshold of decency with their leaflets.
136/138 Andrea/Valerie. Oh come on ….. it was a wonderful wheeze, if only to see the opposition faces !!
At the top of this thread, what party is the “NOT WANTED: NICOLA DAVIES” leaflet from.
At I guess I would say BNP. But that would appear to be out of context with the article.
141. That’s the trouble - it has that aren’t-we-clever backslapping thing about it…
Beyond the pale.
140. You can say it’s Reading East.
The 2 tories candidate (+ Liam Fox) lost the libel case against Salter because they repeated The Fugitive’s claims. Tony Page was arrested twice for cottaging.
141. No, Jack. It’s dirty campaign. They suggest things that are not not true knowing they’re not true and that those slogans can be misinterpretated.
re 142. The poster was from the Hodge Hill Labour campaign which I think was masterminded by Tom Watson.
144 - I knew you’d know the constituency Andrea, but we have had the odd discussion about dear Jane. And you would have known anyway.
I think the indecency arrests would not have happened nowadays, and the libel case was irrelevant. I actually complained about some of the LD activist mailings I received, and I know that many LD leaflets went undelivered as they were so nasty. I only hope some Labour and Tory deliverers ditched leaflets too.
Had Jane Griffiths actually stood down, and there was talk of it, it would have made for the nastiest by-election campaign ever.
143 Valerie. Far be for me to defend the yellow peril but I regard Mike’s little jape as hugely amusing and at the lowest end of negative. And if the Tories only managed to squeeze a win by a couple of dozen votes from an “outsider” insurgent Lib Dem candidate then it doesn’t say much for their campaign ………. and some wonder why the “Tories don’t do by-elections”.
135 But Mike, why did you do that? Didn’t you think that was immoral?
I fear you’re right about negative campaigning, but I don’t want you to be. Politics matters too much for it all to be character assassination. I would not go negative until the other party did it first.
130 UKpaul - I don’t understand this point. If people want effective, hard working representatives, where they live and their outside interests clearly impact on their ability to do the job.
Sitting in a very hot South West London makes it almost impossible for me to represent people in Scotland (where I’m from). It’s why most selection committees demand that candidates move into the constituency. If they don’t then it is completely legitimate to question their ability to do the job.
It’s why the Tories attacks on Mark Hunter misfired - voters knew that living a mile or so away from the constituency did not impact on his ability to do the job.
RE 148, Why would we want to get into the same gutter?
145 Andrea. See 148 …. but with knobs on.
151 Benedict. Because the Tories want to win easily and the campaign didn’t have the wit (literally) to dismiss a cheeky leaflet.
……………………………..
NOTE : All parties fight dirty if they can get away with it. No party hack has the right to get all po-faced about it !!!
148. Sorry, Jack, but I can’t find any justification in that slogan. It’s clearly from Mike’s words that they knew the duplicity of the slogan and they aimed at it.
I don’t find them amusing at all.
147. SBS, you’re right that those offences are not offences anymore. Labour outlawed them (Chris Bryant led the campaign to outlaw them)
50 - I just disagree with that point. I don’t think it’s wrong to have Scottish MPs in England or those born overseas for example. A modern society needs mobility, in fact jobs demand it. I’ve lived in five very different areas myself, that doesn’t stop me being able to move and live somewhere else in the same way that I have done throughout my life so far. If someone has interests in one place then that doesn’t preclude them being able to work effectively in a different area.
144. “Tony Page was arrested twice for cottaging.”
Is this some incursion against the Chipolata Kid’s policy of disallowing domestic construction in bits of England where people want to live?
Some dictionary definitions for the day found elsewhere:
‘Shagpile’:(N) def: Stack of money from rich foreign backers packed on carpet in Minister’s empty office, devoid of furniture or any useful items.
‘Croquet’ :(N) def: Feeble utterance of toad-like Minister as fellow party members hammer balls through hoops while they dish the dirt. As in: “Croak: “Hey!!!”
‘Sheridan’:(N) def: Non-migratory and less credible form of Galloway.
‘Tadpole’:(N) def: (1)inseminatory tool used by party ‘poke her’ king. (2)Chipolata devoid of Cocked ale stick.
E 154, What laws were abolished?
153. Jack, the thing Mike described is worse IMO, because it’s not an openly negative campaign, but a more subtle one.
1549. We discussed the whole question of negative campaigning a few days back. It’s inevitable that more and more of it will corrupt the political debate because if ‘winning here’ at all costs is all that matters to you, frankly, it works.
If you wanted to put a stop to it, that would be easy.
All political campaigning could become subject to the same laws as commercial advertising, at the moment it is given a free pass from the ‘legal, decent and honest’ test that applies to all commercial product promotion.
Making even statements that are, like Mikes example above, misleading by implication (Like saying ‘Unlike some Chocolate brands we could mention, nobody ever got salmonella from eating *our* chocolate bars…’) is not allowed, even if the statement is technically true.
The problem I think is that regulators fear that they would be bogged down with partisan complaints.
141 - Jack, Yeah, right, wow, wake up one morning for a spot of canvassing - and I mean a local council by-election for pity’s sake - only to find yourself being accused by insinuation of financial corruption.
Ho, ho, ho, what a jolly jape. Restores one’s faith in the democratic process, doesn’t it? Don’t know about the opposition’s face at the time (chin up, old bean, taht’s politics), but I would wager that you and Mike (perhaps with ColinW and Zebidee) who are creased up with mirth here.
Anybody remember “Vote Labour on Xth May and live on a diet of Brussels.” Tory slogan for 1994(?) Euros.
(For Andrea’s benefit: this is an attempted pun on Brussels sprouts, a vegetable hated by many people.)
Positive? Negative? Funny? Daft?
re 149. As I recall the Tory had been involved in a planning fight with the council she was trying to be elected to so what we were saying did resonate.
The slogan came out of desperation because we could not think of anything that linked our man to the area. So making a virtue of the fact that he wasn’t local dealt with a potential negative.
In any campaign you need a “sound bite” for use on the door-step when you are canvassing. The “..having no financial or property interests in the ward” line fitted the bill perfectly.
“Immoral”? - what we said was truthful and it is a line I would use again in the same circumstances.
160. No, John O, but hardly bothered either. The ‘clever’ thing about such an element in a campaign is that it would glean not a single vote from anyone who did not already think (for pre-held reasons) that there was another candidate standing whose financial probity was more than in question - at the same time, heading off the ‘not from round here’ stuff before your opposition present it better.
158 Andrea. Can’t the Tories do subtle then ?? … or indeed combat it.
We’ll just have to agree to disagree. Tut tut … a dispute with my “Italian mistress” as Mrs Jack W affectionately calls you and the site too !! …… There’ll be tears before bedtime.
157. Benedict, I think the offences of gross indecency, buggery and soliciting by men have been replaced by a new one.
On reflection I can’t recall to have read what exactly the Labour candidate was doing when arrested, so I wouldn’t be sure if he would have been arrested anyway with current laws.
160 John O. Don’t go all Melanie Phillips on me !!
If the local Tories couldn’t cut the mustard countering this sort of leaflet then heaven help the voters when they get their hands on the levers of power.
And BTW I’d have found the incident equally full of mirth if the Tories had thought of it …. but then again Tories and By-elections ?????????
164. Oh, Jack, I’ll never have a bitch fight with you
I don’t agree at all with. Naturally.
166 - Jack, let’s have a constitutional settlement. I’ll ditch Melanie if you cease the bulimic bombast of righteous indignation about the Major minor years.
A Deal?
Mike,
I understood your post to mean you were trying to imply a negative on your opponent which you believed to be false, ie that his ‘interests’ in the ward ie being a resident had led him to be corrupt. The line implies that the other guy has interests and is behaving dishonestly because of them whereas your guy is scandal-free.
If that was not the intent of the line, then that’s OK, but that is how your post read to me anyway.
132 (As the LDs are now starting to parachute in people to seats already held, - like Clegg and Huhne - will other parties use the same tactics?)
They already did!
They made huge play of Huhne being ‘parachuted in’ to Eastleigh. In fact they produced one leaflet that was actually parachute shaped!
The attack had some impact but as Huhne had already moved in and had had several years publicity as an active MEP for the area it wasn’t fatal.
167 Andrea. Gone With The Political Wind …… Final Scene
Andrea O’Hara. …. But Jack, what about us ?????
Jack W Butler. …. Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn !! (Exits picking up his portmanteau, full of Jacobite bar chart leaflets)
Andrea O’Hara (Flings herself on Cowley Street steps) … But I still have ‘John O’ Wilkes …………
37. You obviously know nothing about physics…never heard of the inverse square law of electromagnetic radiation then? You also know nothing about the way cellphones work. When you make or receive a call your phone transmitter ramps up the power the further you are from a phone mast.
result.. the safest place to live is near a phone mast unless you really want to blast your brain with electromagnetic radiation at close range. Not advisable, especially if you are a child.
And of course your NuLab hypocrisy was exposed just a few weeks after the Hodge Hill byelection when Nicola Davies’ boss was a feted guest at the Labour Party Conference.
171. and who’s Melanie Hamilton?
168 John O. “Deal or No Deal?” …… Some deal !!
I fear I’ve been ripped off by the Captain Bob …….
I’ll phone a friend on it !!
RE. Mike Smithson’s jolly jape in Beds, I’m not sure why anyone is very surprised by this. Implying or even openly accusing local Tory councillors of being financially corrupt has been a standard part of the Lib Dem armoury for many years. I can remember this kind of stuff as far back as the early 1980s in my part of the world. It is a good way of energizing the ‘anti-everything’ tendency among the voters (always a good source of Lib Dem support) by playing to their core prejudices.
175. Fred and then maybe they claim with an innocent look “we? never. If we did something, we didn’t mean it. It was just a misterpretation by others”?
175 Fred. Gone With The Political Wind ……….
Mammy Fred. But Missy Andrea these Lib Dems have been pulling your pig-tails since yus was a baby ….. What’ll we do ???
Andrea O’Hara. Mammy Fred … if we can’t beat them we’ll just have to move to Bromley Plantation
Mammy Fred. Oh Missy Andrea
176. How did you guess, caro ragazza? Actually they often don’t even bother to do that.
OT. The Met Office is reporting that a new July record for temperature has been reached !! Not saying where yet ….. my guess is John Prescott’s Y fronts.
Confess that was excited when I saw that a Labour MP (Kevin Hughes) had died this morning. I am afraid I had never heard of him but sounds a decent chap,. Anyway the so and so knew he was ill and didnt fight the last election - spoilsport!
80. Charming!
172, So since the scientific evidence is so clear-cut, I suppose we’ll find Lib Dems up and down the country are in favour of phone masts near schools and hospitals?
I’m sure we wouldn’t find them trying to whip up people against phone masts in places where someone else controls the council, would we?
177. Jack, dear, do you recall when the war is finished and (an almost poor) Scarlet is back at Tara? At one point Jonas Wilkerson offers to buy Tara….do you recall Scarlett’s reaction? That’s what some Libdems would deserve. And that’s what Andrea O’Hara would do
180: Ghoulish
183 Andrea. You’re a very naughty Scarlett (wo)man !!
BTW Andrea, how is the Lebanon crisis playing with the new Italian government and more broadly the public … any consensus ??
185. The government line is that Israeli has the right to defend itself, but his reaction was not proportioned. The CR is backing Israeli and the hard left is very critical. The government official line is in the between.
The most crucial political topic at the moment is Afghanistan. The parliament has to vote to keep (and finance) Italian soldiers down there. The far left is not very happy. Today the House of Deputies voted and well, no surprises there because the CL majority is large. I think there has not been rebels in the end, but a communist MP resigned his seat because he didn’t want to vote for the motion, but he didn’t want to break the party line either.
The problem is the senate where the rebels (8 the potential rebels at the moment) can be crucial.
OT but has Anna stopped posting? I have not heard from her in some time.
187. She has started working, so I think she’s quite busy all day (and probably tired at evening)
87 - Me neither, but as she was (is) a student at Oxford, I suspect that she may simply be no longer studying but enjoying the summer hols after exams etc. and not sat at a computer all day.
134. Mark. Where are Labour’s votes going to come from? I’ve no idea. In the past I might have said from Tories fearful of their own leaders who liked Tony. Now they’ve their got their own ‘Tony’ that doesn’t apply. And if I’ve had enough I can’t imagine how most to the left of me must be feeling.
Weird - I was wondering where Anna had gone to this afternoon. I’m sure she’s got better things to do than sitting by a computer on a day like this though.
back off to eat some more ice…
187/89/91. Anna seems to have lots of fans here
Anna wrote on of my least favourite posts on here but she’s nice and female and religious so she brings more different things to the party than most of us.
190 - I suspect Labour have reached floor level - most of their supporters who’d consider abandoning them have done so by now. Unlike Jack, I don’t believe there is that much churn - I think a surprising number of voters are surprisingly loyal - except it isn’t really loyalty, it’s a) stubbornness (people will stick to a position long after it makes sense to do so) and b) ignorance (I would suggest that it’s the less well-informed voter who sticks to his party - they kind of assume that if the Conservative Party were the right party for them in 1970 then that’s probably still the case now). I don’t think Roger falls into either of those categories.
168. “I’ll ditch Melanie ” John how deep is the ditch and where is the grid reference to send one’s slurry truck?
(As the LDs are now starting to parachute in people to seats already held, - like Clegg and Huhne - will other parties use the same tactics?)
In both Sheffield Hallam and Eastleigh there were one member one vote ballots of the party members. In both seats, Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne fought the selections against other very strong candidates - in Hallam one candidate was Jo Swinson (elected an MP elsewhere) and in Eastleigh there were two very well known local councillors. I’d hardly call that parachuting.
170. Indeed. In Eastleigh the Tories put out a parachute shaped leaflet repeating over and over that Chris Huhne wasn’t local and then had the cheek to say the Lib Dem campaign was negative.
136 - “That’s a classic example of dirty Libdem campaign!
One thing is saying that the opponent is not local or has too many jobs, another thing is suggesting that there were “dirty goings on with the Tory candidate” when there aren’t.
That’s exactly why I tend not to like the Libdems. They’re those subtle suggestion they like to do and they’re so proud of that irritate me.”
So you prefer the less subtle suggestions used by the Tories such as “shocking crime record of (insert the name of Lib Dem candidate here)”, above a newspaper report about a rape case?
Having read Mike Smithson’s analysis at the top of this thread and having been involved on the periphery of a few campaigns against the Liberal Democrats over the years, I don’t reckon Lord Reynard will be quaking in his boots at this.
Avoiding by-elections in the first place really goes without saying. I don’t think Tories have “caused” a by-election other than by death for some years now.
The reason the legal expenditure max went up is because all the main parties found it impossible to fight a by-election without exceeding the normal Parliamentary limit. I haven’t heard anyone else suggest that the Liberals win because they spend the most.
The idea of selecting ethnic candidates shows a touching naivety about how the Liberal Democrats campaign. What they would do is to brief their canvassers to say “A lot of racist Tory/Labour (as applicable)voters aren’t supporting their candidate in this election. It’s terrible isn’t it, but only the Libdems have a chance of winning here.” or words to that effect.
One final thought, has anyone considered how effective Reynard would actually be if he worked for the Tories or Labour? Don’t forget his brief at the moment is to persuade people who don’t really care much for any of the parties to give his party a go when it doesn’t matter. His by-election formula works quite well but he hasn’t been in the Alistair Campbell league when it comes to Parliamentary elections - or even the Lynton Crosby league.
Here’s an alternative strategy which the Tories should with hindsight have employed in Bromley: talk up the LibDems (a sub-strategy of “get out the vote”)
From the outside it looks as if the fundamental reason did Tories did so ‘badly’ at Bromley (aside from the obvious distortions caused by reporting change in size of majority when the Labour vote disintegrates) was because a large chunk of their usual supporters stayed at home. And UKIP’s poor showing suggests that a large factor in this was a belief that the outcome was inevitable, rather than dissatisfaction with the Tories.
197. That campaign is bad (and it’s even senseless). No-one said otherwise.
That kind of subtle campaign Mike S was so proud of are viler. They try to insinuate something without really saying it, but aiming at the same effect.
The Moray expenditures were:
SNP £33,547.44.
Con £91,132.09
LD £42,233.80
Lab £10,025.30.
NHSFirst £1238.61
So the party that spends the most isn’t exactly the winner.
Mike S, I took another look at your post:
“We brought in a candidate from a few miles away and campaigned with the slogan - “Alan S has no financial or property interests in the ward making it sound as though there were dirty goings on with the Tory candidate.”
That is what I am asking you if you didn’t stop to think if it were immoral. “Making it sound as though” certainly implies you thought there weren’t, but you were going to smear him anyway.
Isn’t that just wrong? LibDems are meant to be liberals, small l, concerned with rights and wrongs. Why win by smearing an innocent candidate. It would be ironic if the LibDems were the party that ultimately forced British candidates into US style opposition research and smearing each other because the only way to do it was to “go negative” from the start.
And “go negative” is a euphemism. It does not mean a negative campaign about the other guy’s policies, it means a negative campaign about the other guy, himself. IE it means a smear.
DEFECTION ALERT:
Lib Dem Cllr defects to Tories:
http://www.alton-herald-today.co.uk/today/options/news/newsdetail.cfm?id=27729
Thanks for sharing that with us Rik, It must have been difficult!
Whether someone defecting because ‘he is a family man and Mark Oaten is a poor roll model’ is the right sort of defector -only the inclusive Cameron can say……..
Iain Dale has a piece on his blog which if true could be deeply damaging to UKIP. The allegation is that UKIP is in merger talks with the BNP, to be joined by the DUP in a new British Independence and Democracy Party.
The story concludes that Farage would be the leader of the new party!
I find this hard to believe. Would Paisley agree?????
98. Interesting post, Richard, thanks!
I would eat my hat if that were true.
205 UKIP seem to be a declining force anyway whilst BNP are more worryingly doing quite well in local council elections . I agree that Paisley is unlikely to want to join with these 2 parties , I just do not see any advantage to DUP in this .
203. Rik he should resign his seat and stand as a Conservative. It always galls me the arrogance of elected members who swap sides as though people voted for them not the party. As we only lost the seat by 27 we seem like we might have a good chance of regaining it, but as a Conservative.
205/208 This underlines my concern re the BNP. Many of their voters are lending them their vote to register their unhappiness at the current parties and at the ‘nose in the trough’ impression they have of politicians. Cash for Coronets and dodgy dossiers have taken their toll, but misty memories of Jonathon Aitken and Jeffrey Archer and Neil Hamilton mean we Tories have to take our share of the blame. Not to mention the MP who was selling tours of Westminster on his website…
My round robin of today’s press has Tories in Suffolk (says Mirror) putting their own expense payments up massively having just cut services by many millions. And there is to be a Mass Masturbation (no, the Pope and Cherie need not worry) televised on Channel 4. No doubt with a live commentary by Jonathan Ross? I wondered whether a central Westminster venue might be being considerd to reduce transport costs and keep things ‘green’.
Meanwhile, if you go onto Fox News, you can see a video link of just one of a series of ‘respected’ senior politicians/ commentators who make Melanie Philips seem like Florence from the Magic Roundabout, suggesting now is the time to bomb Syria/Iran/N Korea/Penge into oblivion pour encourage les outres or to do a Vinnie Jones and get your retaliation in first in World War Three we are apparently all up to our necks in already. So there you go.
210. Commentary by Jonathon Ross? That would be “rank”.
210 Zebidee we have proposed to raise our allowances from £7000 to £9000 following many years of frozen allowances, in line with the recommendations of the Independent Renumeration Panel. Part of this is down to the difficulty we have in attracting members who are not (in the words of the Labour leader who is supporting this) the idle rich or the idle poor. There is never a good time to do this, but if we are to ensure that we have the best quality minds and a representative group of councillors who reflect their community we have to ensure that people are not too badly financially effected by the work they put in. The panel concluded that this was a fair representation given that 50% of our work is voluntary.
For myself, it was brought home to me the level of work I am doing when my business partner rang me at 8pm last Thursday to ask where I was, as I hadn’t been in the office all week - I did 49 hours for Suffolk County Council and just 34 for the company I rely on for my living.
208. Agreed Mark, no upside for the DUP at all in such a deal. They are the dominant parliamenary force in NI while their supposed partners are fringe parties with almost zero chance of winning parliamentary seats. But some kind of deal between UKIP and the BNP (or more likely, chunks thereof) does seem on the cards.
213. My local UKIP had to reselect after the prospective candidate for 2005 GE was revealed to have attended a BNP rally in Kesgrave. He lives in my division and used to tell us that he was a Liberal! Last May someone from the Midlands drove down to Suffolk and set light to the UKIP poster on his fence. So I wouldn’t be surprised to see a UKIP/BNP merger. In my view they are inextricably linked.
208/13/14. what do you think the electoral effects of such deal will be ?
Only 9k for a County Councillor? That’s pretty poor. As a district one I’m on 4.5k
215 Hopefully disastrous! However it might go one of two ways. UKIP will either give the BNP credibility, or the BNP will be the final nail in the Fruitcake debate!
216 Thanks Chris, could you let the Suffolk papers know!
213 Back in the 1970s, the National Front tried to forge close links with the DUP, Vanguard and the anti-Sunningdale wing of the UUP, and were rebuffed, because they had nothing to offer to parties who already had MPs, and who were aware of the NF’s unpopularity.
I imagine the DUP would take a similar view this time round. Unless and until the BNP have a good chance of winning Parliamentary seats, they have nothing to offer the DUP to outweigh all the negative factors surrounding them. And that is leaving aside the fact that the more religious supporters of the DUP would find the BNP’s racism pretty unappealing.
Actually, the article that Iain Dale cites seems to be s**t stirring. There is no evidence at all that either BNP or UKIP are losing support to the “English Nationalist Movement” (whatever that is).
If a chunk of UKIP did join the BNP, it would be enormously damaging to the former,and very beneficial to the latter.
217. We increased our allowances from 3.7 to 4.5 about a year ago after 6 or 7 years of petty much the same level. County Councillors I think are at about 12, maybe 11.5k.
There should be some form of uniform increase per annum. What always tends to happen is the issue is put off for political reasons for years and then an independent body recommends a 25% raise. Madness
219 ‘If a chunk of UKIP did join the BNP, it would be enormously damaging to the former,and very beneficial to the latter.’
I can’t see what would be in it for UKIP? All the benefits come for the BNP not UKIP.
I liked one contributor’s (apparently serious) suggestion that Michael Portillo would make a good leader for this new party.
222. I think it would produce a serious bitch-fight with Diane on Neil’s sofa
223 - mind you, he’s made so many about-turns in his career that anything’s possible.
221 - Yes, there seems no evidence that large numbers of BNP members are so fed up with Griffin’s leadership (which was taken them from 3,000 votes in 2000, to 238,000 on May 5th), that they want to jump ship to join UKIP. People who leave the BNP tend to do so because they think it’s insufficiently hard line.
221 “I can’t see what would be in it for UKIP? All the benefits come for the BNP not UKIP.”
Maybe they need money, and the BNP have some people in the background quietly bankrolling them. Didn’t UKIP have a ’sugar daddy’ who used to give them loads, until one day he announced that he was supporting the Conservatives?
225 “People who leave the BNP tend to do so because they think it’s insufficiently hard line.”
Sean, please tell me that’s not true!
I think that I will have to go and lie down . . .
227 I thought the only people who left the BNP for not taking a hard enough line were people in Combat 18, and ended up taking a line of Her Majesty’s Pleasure…
Interestingly the Tories in Devon have made the centerpiece of all their campaigns the decision by the LD administration to accept a watered down version of the independent commission’s recommmendations for allowance increases.
That despite the fact they also voted for it and were sharing power when the initial decision was taken, as were Labour?
That is definitely what I would call negative campaigning…
The suggestion that there is any prospect of a merger or electoral pact between BNP and UKIP is completely ludicrous.
The four suggestions about by-elections:
1. Try to stop by elections in the first place.
Totally disagree. Without by-elections, there would be no purpose in life for us anoraks.
2. Starve the Lib Dems of cash to fight campaigns.
That’s a matter for them, not the law.
3. Choose candidates from the ethnic minorities.
Patronising tokenism.
4. Go negative right from the start.
No way. I’ve always campaigned positively on what I believe in. If the Lib Dems indulge in personal negative filthy campaigns then I’m happy to let them keep their monopoly on it and be condemned by the rest of us normal decent people.
Blimey - top of the list is an agenda to avoid by-elections. That in itself is a council of despair.
Realistically, I don’t think we could expect, for example, Labour or Peter Mandleson to refuse to have him as trade commissioner for fear of a by-election. And preventing an MP drinking himself to death, for example, is probably more than the whips can manage!
I think the campaign finance one is a clever point. If you remember, the high limit was created after years of all parties breaking the official limit and no-one challenging the result. There would be an interesting strategy available for the Lib Dems of campaigning as normal, accepting the challenge by Labour or Tories for breaking the limit, and then running a new campaign with hardly any leaflets complaining that Labour (or the Tories) were bad losers. Would that work?
I’ll also be betting on the Lib Dems next time round! The exceptions, of course, are marginals not involving the Lib Dems. Surely they can’t win those?
But Ben the Lib Dem councillor you replaced was happy to do the job for £ 7,000 as were you when you were elected or was your narrow win in part because your polcy statement did not say you were going to put up your alowance by 30%
227 and 228, if you’ve the stomach for it, take a look at Stormfront, and you’ll see what I mean.
There is a party called England First (a merger of the White Nationalist Party and Blackburn National Socialist Party)which won two seats on Blackburn Unitary Authority on May 5th, and which objects to the BNP’s soft line on the “Jewish Question”; the National Front, which condemns the BNP for dropping forcible repatriation; and a variety of independents who think Griffin is selling out.
“Also introduce strict health screening for prospective candidates in winnable seats and for those standing again. Provide advice and support so existing MPs can enjoy a healthier life-style.”
No-one picked up that point so far, but I think that those suggestions are a bit unworkable.
Should parties call back all people on the approved list to ask for their health situation? Or asking health conditions before selection meetings (picture the scene at hustings: “sorry, do you have any intentions to die and leave us fighting a by-election against the Libdems?”). The Chief Whip calling old MPs to have a “word” with them?
In some cases they reselected candidates in no so good conditions. I wondered why they fielded Rachel Squire again (because of the boundary changes I think Gordon could have gone for Dunfermline and West Fife), but I suppose that it would have been very insensitive to tell her not to stand because there were chances she was going to die.
“I’ll also be betting on the Lib Dems next time round! The exceptions, of course, are marginals not involving the Lib Dems. Surely they can’t win those?” - oh, but they do, time and time again. Brent East, Leicester South, and Bromley was bloody close! None of these seats were remotely marginal before the by-election.
Nick P - good man! ha ha!
Mike I have an even more cynical take on how by-elections work. The contents of leaflets are significant but that is all. What determines winners and losers, I think, is primarily the number of leaflets that go through letterboxes. And so, the reason the Lib Dems win is this: they simply put three times more leaflets through every letter box than anyone else. And they can do this, despite having several times fewer memebers than anyone else, because Lib Dems love by-elections, party HQ really pushes it to the extent that half of Cowley Street simply decamps to the constituency - literally something like half. And because morale is fantastic because all these wins are written up on front pages as ’sensational’ wins. Meanwhile Tories and Labour can’t keep the morale up because they’re used to losing.
Obviously content matters quite a lot, and being in government is a handicap. But if the leaflets are half competent, it’s the number of leaflets that really counts, not least in establishing that the Lib Dems are ‘winning here’.
And of course Patsy Calton knew she was going to die very soon as presumably did most of her team…
I have bet varying amounts on the Lib Dems winning nearly every by-election for the past few years. (Not BG - backed the Indies there!)
Overall I am a few thousand up as a result.
Even in the poorer campaigns I have been able to offset my losses as the odds shifted.
I’m with Mike on this and foresee much further profit.
229. No, that’s just hypocrisy & can easily be used against the NuLabCon pondlife.
Just because Mike likes the tactics in 4. does not mean that all or even most other Lib Dems do. I spoke to my Lib Dem MP after the Bromley by-election campaign and he said “there were leaflets I would never allow out in this constituency”. But then, he didnt get a 14% swing either…
I am sorry Ben but having read some of the stories in the online edition of the Esat Anglian Daily Times I just cannot see how you can justify giving yourself a 30% increase when you are cutting 14 million from social care for the most needy in your community . Axing grants and forcing a club for the elderly with disabilities to close are not I would say what you campaigned on to get elected . How did your party mismanage things so badly in the year or so since you took control of the council ?
I personally think the widespread practice of distributing “free newspapers”, masquerading as neutral publications should be more closely scrutinised.
132 - Is it fair game to use a line like “Who would you prefer, local man or the ex-MP for Scunthorpe?”
Depends where the folds on the leaflet go.
229 Jon Is that not stealing LibDem tactics in Scotland…. be in coalition but blame the partners in that pact for all the ills that they have jointly wished on the country?
187-191 Fear not! I’m still alive (just…)! As Andrea says, my work is getting somewhat in the way of more important things…
On the Lib Dem issue: I think it’s really important to go negative early. Voters always say that negative campaigning turns them off and that they don’t like it, however you rarely see voters actually turning out for the candidate who runs a positive campaign even if all the rest go negative. Mud slinging may be a root cause of apathy, but at least those who do vote are more likely to pick you if the mud sticks to your opponents rather than yourself.
Legally speaking, I think Tommy Sheridan is now toast.
186 Andrea. Thanks for that.
re 202. The objective of the line about the candidate “having no financial or property interest in the ward” was to deal with our big problem that our man was not a local. We got in first before the Tories or Labour could make the same point in a negative fashion. That was the primary motivation.
What our opponents should have done was to attack us for not having a local person and to ridicule the line that we were taking. They didn’t and more fool them.
Commentator - go and look through the Tory Bromley material and I’m sure you will agree with me that there’s a marked lack of bite or urgency. It just looks complacent and the leaflets are plain boring.
Until the Tories get this right then every by election will be a humiliation.
247. Jack, it was a pleasure for my Rhett
4 rebels at the House of Deputies regarding the Afghanistan military presence. All commies. Vlad (wearing orange) was loyal.
246 I do feel sorry for the SSP activists who will see the party lose all their seats next year. The tabliod press are having a field day with this case.
http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/hi/news/5054933.html
Thanks Marcus, I’ve send you a message via your website.
248. And no, Mike Smithson, it’s not that easy.
Saying “your candidate is not local and blah, blah” a la Bromley way is different than using slongans to make “sound as though there were dirty goings on with the Tory candidate” as you declared early.
Sorry, but my opinion of you has really gone down today.
250. I think suing was a dramatic mistake. It could have been possible that people could have forgotten the NOTW allegations if he hadn’t sued and just took a “it’s rubbish” line (without taking actions)
PMQs seem to have got a bit drowned out in this thread today
I was struck by the Tory MPs chanting “dropped” as David Cameron spoke. Rather a deft touch of Punch and Judy / Xmas panto exuberance, but a bit odd to be doing it in support of someone (DC) who has so publicly attacked just that approach to PMQs previously!
253 I agree - it was political suicide suing the NOTW. The Scottish edition of the Sun has four pages of lurid tales today. I did not see what the Record had. All very negative for the SSP who have to stand by and wonder what the fallout will be. For many TS was the SSP.
249/252 Andrea. “Sorry, but my opinion of you has really gone down today.”
Now stop being theatrical Scarlett.
256. Jack, but it’s true. And I also think he couldn’t care less!
257 Andrea. Somehow I don’t see our very own Mike as Rhett Butler …. more what the Lib Dem butler saw !!
Hodge Hill and Hartlepool amply prove that going negative on the Lib Dems doesn’t work. The swings were enormous, even though they were not enough. I quote the Guardian (The party retained the seat (Hodge Hill) with a majority of 460, but the swing to the Liberal Democrats was more than 27%, rivalling the best byelection swings for Charles Kennedy’s party, including Brent East last year. ) and The swing to the Liberal Democrats (in Hartlepool) was 18%, only two points less than the swing which they secured to win the Leicester South byelection in July
258. Oh, Jack, don’t make me feel bad. Was I too harsh?
And you were Rhett….he can be Aunt Pittypat
252 Andrea: You have to appreciate the “win-at-any-costs” principle for its ruthlessness.
I don’t like negative campaigning and usually get quite prissy about it when I receive negative literature. However if a party believes that its policies would be best for the country/council, then ignoring a few principles for the longer-term good (ie winning) can be justified IMHO.
261. Anna, I gave my opinion about it by private email. I stand firm with it. It goes beyond negative campaign IMO.
262 Fair dos, your majesty!
‘Night all…
260 Andrea. Not too harsh …. anyway if we can’t stand the heat we shouldn’t sit on the aga.
264. Now I feel bad (but I blame Anna). Sorry Mike if it was too harsh.
265 Andrea. I sure Mike is big enough and ugly enough to sit on even a six oven aga …. and for quite some time !!
………………………….
Any interesting by-elections tomorrow ??
Hi Jack I have summarised tomorrow’s byelections here http://www.vote-2006.co.uk/index.php?topic=325.0
242 - And what other restrictions would you put on freedom of speech?
243 - very good!
I thought the Lib Dems should have used:
POLL BLOW
FOR 3 JOBS
in Bromley on the same logic
According to Newsnight 53% of voters want Charles Kennedy back as Lib Dem leader!
267 Many thanks Mark.
BTW, How’s your favourite pub sport doing in this weather ……. naked bar billiards is it yet ??
270 VftSW. Which means that 47% of voters are sober then !!
I don’t play in the summer league , Jack - too many other things to do . Did not go to Tunbridge Wells last weekend for the Kent Open either but my son and other friends did .
Who is your money on in the Open starting tomorrow ?
Goosen at 25s is good odds.
53% think CK a better leader than MC, who gets 26%. These figures are meaningless. We are not on 26% in the polls, and would not get 53% if CK came back.
Negative campaigning: surely the most typical is “don’t vote X, as it’s a wasted vote.” All three major parties are guilty.
272 - Then over half the voters must be drunk then!!
274 Mark. I’ve had 3 EW bets this year and I’ve opted for a good home performance :
Monty @ 40/1 .. Lee Westwood @ 100/1 and Paul Broadhurst @ 200/1
The Hoylake course is rock hard so the course will play much shorter and some suprise names may also appear atop by late Sunday.
The way that people don’t seem to understand what negative camaigning actually is (or affect to do so), gives some indication as to why they don’t see the problem.
Good to see Ming, again, lashing out at Israel and the US on Newsnight. Solana also stuck the boot in today. The strength of those who see terrorism as the answer is growing day by day as some dither and others run scared of Bush and his crew.
Good performance from Ming and a terrible one from a strident and arrogant Martha Kearney. The ’specially selected panel’ of non Lib Dem voters was a joke, but Ming handled with good grace.
I particularly liked the Labour woman thinking about defecting to the Lib Dems, but not so sure now that they had dropped the 50% uper rate pledge. That will be the 50% upper rate of tax that Labour has had 9 years to introduce - while allowing those earning the minimum wage to pay 85% marginal tax rates!
Andrea - sometimes your high horse is too much to bear. We all appreciate your interest and knowledge of UK politics, but the idea that Mike Smithson and the Bedford Liberal Democrats are some sort of evil campaigning machine is ludicrous and not born out by election results. Mike’s line is perfectly acceptable and an extremely good example of drawing a positive out of a potentially negative situation. The fault (if any) is on the Tories for not playing the local card.
Perhaps Italian politics is just too gentile?
On a slightly different area, but staying with leaflets and the content…
A question to all:-
Does anyone know of a local political party that has paid-for adverts on it’s leaflets (outside election expenses periods) ?
I ask because I’ve just thought I’ve not seen any apart from in my area.
Cheers,
Matt.
O/T. The Boundary Commission today confirmed its revised recommendations for Greater Manchester as final. This completes the boundary reviews for England. The Commission must submit its final report to the Home Secretary by 12th April 2007.
181 - believe there were paid for adverts in Oxford in the late 1980s.
180. Dan, I’m happy you disagree with me. It convinced me I’m right. You know your comments aren’t usually exactly an example of positivism.
I’m too too much to bear? My dear, skip my comments. It’s easy to do.
Mark Senior - thanks for the useful by-election preview - would be greeat if you do this every week.
Matt - I’ve thought about having ads, since 40000 deliveries is obviously worth something to advertisers, but was put off by the hassle gettin gads, recording them in accounts, etc.
BNP-UKIP merger: pretty unthinkable, I’d say - there is some voter overlap but very little similarity of members. Doubt if the DUP would go for it either - UKIP maybe, BNP no.
I might have heard from two of the BNP-are-wimps crowd this week: someone wrote to the local paper claiming I was a Jewish immigrant and had no right to speak for decent Brits (or words to that effect), and I had a direct letter from someone else living near him who said much the same but used stronger language (Shylock, scum, etc.): both suggested I’d anglicised my name, presumably from something like Nicolai Palmerevski. Weird stuff! The paper invited me to comment before printing it - I’ve said mildly that that I’m not Jewish or an immigrant, but would be perfectly happy to be either.
182. They still have one outstanding issue - to confirm the name of the Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford constituency. This is expected in the next few weeks.
They said in their annual report that they will issue their final report (which actually now goes to the Lord Chancellor) by 31 October 2006.
186. what’re the other name suggestions for that seat?
280 - What a classic and truly repulsive ‘ends justifies the means’ argument. Insinuating corruption about your opponent because of the weakness of your own candidate, helps wins elections (sadly, it probably does too), and therefore this demonstrates its morality.
Give me Andrea’s high horse a million times…your reaction tells us so much more about you and the kind of politics you espouse than him.
187. I’m not aware of any other suggestions. It’s just that as it was a “modified recommendation” (ie a change from the previous “provisional recommendation”) there has to be a period of consultation before the Commission make it a “final recommendation”.
It’s very unlikely there will be any change - expect it to go final within the next 3 weeks.
232 Mark Senior. ‘But Ben the Lib Dem councillor you replaced was happy to do the job for £ 7,000 ‘
As I’m sure Andrea could tell you, I replaced a Conservative councillor. I am lucky in that I can afford to work hard as a councillor and my work allows me to be flexible with the hours. However I didn’t anticipate averaging nearly 40 hours a week.
241 ‘you are cutting 14 million from social care for the most needy in your community . Axing grants and forcing a club for the elderly with disabilities to close are not I would say what you campaigned on to get elected . How did your party mismanage things so badly in the year or so since you took control of the council ?’
Mark, for a stand still budget this financial year we needed an extra £28 million from the Government. As it wasn’t a General Election year they gave us £4million. They then told us to keep below 5% council tax so we were between a rock and a hard place. None of us have enjoyed making the savings where we have been forced to make them, but we took the decision of making 10% savings on the controllable budget (less the schools) across the board. This has meant that the Adult and Community Services budget has taken the biggest hit, some £14.4million. Many of the things that the council has traditionally done we are no longer able to do. As a council we are moving from a provider service to an enabling service, so some of the service changes are due to that.
With regard to the increases in allowances, there is never a good time to bring these in, but I should point out that the Lib Dems have said to me that it isn’t fair, they should get more! Even though the people of Suffolk rewarded their joint leadership of the council by giving them only 7 councillors out of 75.
I would also point out that by insisting on a reduction in the number of councillors when the boundary review took place (against Labour and Lib Dem plans to put them up to 90) we saved the tax payer many millions of pounds over the next few years. We are very poorly compensated for the immense amount of time we give to the community when compared with similar councils, and the INDEPENDENT panel made a determination that we should receive more. We have saved some money by not backdating it, and by making the group leaders SRA per member of their group rather than a set amount.
Ah Ben so it is all the government’s fault . Yes I do see that you are facing a difficult choice which Lib Dem councils too have to do . It is a pretty thankless job running a council when you have 1 hand tied behind your back . That does not stop your colleagues criticising Lib Dem councils for the decisions they have to make and you have to take criticism for your choices too . The fact is that you have chosen to cut support and help for the needy and poor and disabled and reward yourselves . A not unusual choice in Conservative run councils . I am sure there are many in Suffolk who now regret putting your party into power .
268 - What has free speech got to do with it? I just think that party political literature should be clearly marked as such.
291 - but as you say all parties criticise decisions like this when in opposition even if in another part of the country they would do similar things in office. That’s local politics. Arguably however it is more hypocritical for one NOT local to criticise, as you seem to be doing.
“I might have heard from two of the BNP-are-wimps crowd this week: someone wrote to the local paper claiming I was a Jewish immigrant and had no right to speak for decent Brits (or words to that effect), and I had a direct letter from someone else living near him who said much the same but used stronger language (Shylock, scum, etc.):”
It reminds me of those fascists who thought that Mosley was secretly a Jew, or at any rate, a “Kosher Fascist” (ie in the pay of the Elders of Zion).
293 You are correct the judgement of the decision will lie in the votes of the people in Suffolk . However Conservatives constantly criticise Lib Dem and Labour run councils in other parts of the country and it is equally valid to point out that when Conservatives get into power and are faced with difficult decisions the Conservative instinct is to cut services to the poor and needy and to give priority to extra allowances to themselves .
295 - Mark, Oh, for goodness sake, grow up…what’s getting to you these days? Where’s that jolly, amusing teasing bar billiards champion of yore whose partisanship had a pleasing light touch?
296 Ah John it is the supersensitivity of Conservatives that is getting me down . You come on here and bleat about the incompetence of Lib Dem councils and in Ben’s case how you trounced them last year and took power but cannot face any criticism of what you do when you get it and it’s all the government’s fault anyway .
I have said on here many times that running a council is a poisoned chalice because of the lack of real power but even so that is no excuse for targetting cuts at the poor and disabled and at the same time putting more money in your own pockets .
297 - Mark, “Bleat”? Moi? Ewe should know me better than that.
296 - it’s slowly dawning on him that the Lib Dems are sliding backwards and even his magnificent statitistical sleight of hand can’t hide the fact that given the choice on May 5th voters up and down the country, on aggregate, rejected the Lib Dems. This is a painful realisation and we should give Mark time and space to overcome his grief.
Ben, thank you for devoting so mch of your time to the work of the council; from your local opposition it would be standard local politics but for an outsider to do it with no local context is quite bizarre.
Cllr Redsell
May I refer you to your own authorities accounts for 05/06:
http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyres/A60FCD26-D19B-47DB-AA31-5BB3D1CB8F4A/0/StatementofAccounts.pdf
Page 21 Income increased to £657m from £617m in 04/05 +6.5%
Page 14 Cash Reserves of the Council £55m
and you stil claim the Council has no money and has to make these huge cutbacks in Social Services? whislt at the same time upping allowances by 30%?
Suggest your Cabinet colleagues question the figures some more Cllr
292 - It is. Somewhere on each of those newspapers it will have said somthing along the lines of: Printed by (name and address of printer). Published an promoted by (name of agent) on behalf of Ben Abbotts and the liberal Democrats at (address).
300 Gerry
The total income of the council is 657million but a huge part of this is the Direct Support Grant for schools, which we have to pass directly over to schools and cannot be used for anything else. So it is more complicated than that. Also the cash reserves you are quoting include reserves held by schools and reserves set aside for building projects we are committed to like the new Waveney campus and the Bury St Edmunds Public Service Village. The actual level of the County Fund (General Reserve) is a mere £12million. It would not be prudent to use reserves this year as the government grant will not be any better for the next few years. Therefore what we would save this year we would have to do next year.
I would also point out that the article in the Mirror is not accurate in it’s figures, and that our basic allowances are only £9000. I’m sure Marcus Wood could comment on Lib Dem allowances in Torbay…
301 - Of course it is marked somewhere. It has to be. It’s of course not clearly marked though. And that is done deliberately because people fall for it.
303. I agree with Alex on this issue. But then again I’ve an “hight horse”…