Friday, March 15, 2024

Printing

 

This morning I was in the Lib Dem office printing hundreds of letters for Whickham South and Sunniside. Fortunately the folding machine was working, something of a new experience for me! The big job now is to get the letters stuffed into envelopes and then delivered. Expect some shoe leather to be burnt this coming week.



Missing conference

I had booked up for Lib Dem spring conference a few weeks ago with the expectation that I would be attending for the full three days (starting today). And then I got a message from Whickham Voluntary Library asking me if I would bring some animals to their Easter fair tomorrow. I didn't want to let them down and the appearance of lambs and goat kids outside the fair is always popular. So I told them I would bring a couple of our billy goat kids but would leave the fair at 12pm so I could catch the train to York for conference. It was useful that I hadn't got round to booking a hotel for my conference stay. Instead, I will travel down on Saturday afternoon, return home in the evening, then head back down to York first thing on Sunday morning, returning again in the afternoon. The train journey only takes an hour. It works out much cheaper than getting a hotel!

Is this news?

I'm not sure this merits the title of "news" but the PM today announced that there will not be a general election on 2nd May, the same day as the local elections. Is this a case of stating the bleedin' obvious? No PM is likely to voluntarily go early when his/her party is experiencing the loss of over half of their vote share. So, summer, autumn or winter it will be. I believe the latest date for the general election is 25th January. My money, were I a gambling person (I'm not!) would be on late October. That way the UK gets the election over before the US go to the polls. Imagine if we go after the US instead and all our worst nightmares come true and Trump wins. Imagine Labour and the Conservatives trying to explain what sort of relationship they would have with a Trump Whitehouse. That in itself could become a major election issue. 

Sadly, for the UK as a whole, we have months ahead of us of the Tories fighting themselves. While they are kick boxing themselves into potential oblivion Labour will be mouthing vacuous statements in a bid to tell voters nothing about their policies for fear of alienating the great British public. Looks like 2024 will be a year to forget!

Camera shy

 

We have become so used to online meetings over the past 4 years that in-person meetings now feel rather odd. So, on Tuesday, we had the odd situation of sitting with colleagues at the Gateshead Lib Dem exec at the Civic Centre. We even had sheets of paper rather than sharing something on a screen! The bulk of the meeting was about the local election campaign though Ron Beadle also gave quite a comprehensive report from the council group. That job used to be mine but I happily passed on the baton to Ron when I retired as Group Leader last year.

Thursday, March 14, 2024

Dinner time

 

It seems Lib Dem local parties in the North East have developed a knack of organising fundraising dinners. Last autumn, Gateshead hosted Simon Hughes and Sunderland hosted Wendy Chamberlain MP. Coming shortly to Newcastle is Vince Cable but last week, Sunderland hosted another dinner with Jamie Stone MP as the guest speaker. Jamie is one of the Lib Dem MPs I barely know. He was elected many years after I stopped working for the Lib Dems so, other than his constituency (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) I knew next to nothing about him. He turned out to be quite an entertaining speaker. One of his claims to fame is that he was first elected in 2017, an unexpected victory for the Lib Dems. Given the drubbing we received, his gain of the constituency from the SNP must be regarded as something of a modest miracle!

On a brighter note, though the raffle seemed to go on for ever, I was one of the winners. The bad news is that the scented candle (not quite my thing) will be alighting at the next Sunniside History Society as a raffle prize!

Sunday, February 25, 2024

At your convenience

 

The next meeting of Sunniside History Society will be held on Wednesday 6th March at 7pm at Sunniside Social Club. The speaker is Richard Pears and he will be talking about the history of "The British Toilet". So be ready to take your seat. This is not a crap subject. Hopefully the meeting will be flushed with success. Etc......

Saturday, February 24, 2024

Campaigning in Ryton

 

Ryton ward in Gateshead used to be Lib Dem held. Sadly, it went Labour in the Coalition years and before now we were not in a position to mount a strong campaign. But that is changing. We have a new candidate and a new determination to take on Labour in the ward. Steve Kelly has been adopted by the Lib Dems to take on Labour in the May local elections.

He had a meet-the-people event outside the Coop this morning so I went down to give him a hand. My job was to stand next to the main road holding one of our big diamond posters. I had five toots of support from passing drivers and one person shouted at me (I'm not sure it was complimentary!) All-in-all it was a good event and our profile in Ryton is starting to go back up. The challenging news for me is that in addition to managing election campaigns in Birtley and Whickham South and Sunniside, I am now looking after Ryton as well. Looks like a busy few months ahead.

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

Delivery complete in Sunniside

 

Focus on Sunniside has now been delivered. Hooray! The last patch went out over the weekend when one of our helpers took the Streetgate area. This patch has grown by 89 houses in recent years due to new house building. 

With my ward's Focus now fully delivered, I was able to spend some time in Saltwell over the weekend, helping to deliver our latest Focus there. I hear on the grapevine that Labour were out in Saltwell as well. There are hints of aspiring wannabee MPs hoping to get the selection for the new Gateshead Central and Whickham constituency. There are also hints that Labour may leave the selection of their candidate to the last minute, meaning the national party will parachute in one of their favourites. Given that nearly half the wards in this constituency are represented by Lib Dems, this one will be one to watch at the general election.

Sunday, January 21, 2024

More Focus deliveries

I was back in Birtley yesterday (Saturday 20th January) to deliver another patch of Focuses. And today I was delivering in my own ward. To be precise, I was delivering in Sunniside. We are aiming to get the village delivered by Friday though the weather may be a problem tomorrow.

Friday, January 19, 2024

Planning for our next meeting

I met up with Alan Guest, secretary of the Sunniside History Society, last night in Sunniside Club, to review some of the photos donated to the Society by Francis Newman. Many of the photos were taken in Sunniside 30 years ago though there were some which were much older. We made a selection of photos to present at the next meeting on 1st February. The aim is to get people to share their memories and possibly fill in the gaps in our knowledge of the events that caused the photos to be taken in the first place. Anyone interested in coming to the meeting is welcome. It starts in Sunniside Club at 7pm, £1 for Society members, £2 for visitors.