Labour has already started to throw personal abuse at me, two months away from the election. At the last full council meeting, I was called "Wallace and Vomit". The description was made by John Eagle who describes himself as a "socialist". He is a Labour councillor for Bridges ward in Gateshead and is a former mayor of the borough. Sticking with his descriptive theme, I don't know if Mr Eagle would turn heads if he walked into a room full of people. Whether or not he would turn stomachs is a different matter as Mr Eagle has a history of liking vile abusive comments. In April 2012 I exposed him as the supporter of a Facebook page that backed the violent murder of Margaret Thatcher. The site contained sickening comments such as "Maggie Thatcher needs a high-5. In the Face. With a
baseball bat. Several times." Mr Eagle will no doubt read this post himself. Few meetings go by without his mentioning my blog. Indeed, at the last council meeting, as well as hurling abuse at me, he attacked my blog, not for the first time. Yet, for some reason, he keeps revisiting it. So, with less than 60 days to go, it will be interesting to see if more abuse is thrown at me by the "socialist" chums of Labour. Photo above: John Eagle employs his considerable skills at colouring in children's pictures.
I
arrived at Gateshead Civic Centre yesterday morning for a scruting meeting with DWP
officers about the introduction of Universal Credit, open minded about how the new
system will function. It was clear that Labour turned up with an expectation of
a lecture on a system destined to failure. After all, that’s their narrative,
at least locally. Any benefits reform has been attacked by them though they may
have overlooked the absence of any commitment from Labour nationally to scrap
Universal Credit. Last week, chair of the committee John Eagle had even warned us “not to shoot the
messenger” at this meeting. Sadly for Labour their narrative was completely
undermined by the solid presentation by the DWP officers who showed that many
working people on low incomes are better off under the system if they get a job or take on
more hours.
There
were sensible questions from both sides but also some unhelpful
interventions from the Labour. Martin Verbosity-Gannon rambled
on for ages about how terrible it is that the benefits system subsidises
employers to pay low wages but moved off this subject when he was asked to put
a question by the chairman and was reminded by me that the huge number of in-work
benefits were introduced by his beloved New Labour government (he was a major
fan of Blair, something he prefers people not to be reminded about.)
Tommy Ultra-Verbosity-Graham
rambled on for ages about, well goodness knows what. The only thing I remember
from what he said was his announcement that he decided to spend his last 10
years of his working years as a civil servant as he wanted an easier life. I’m
not sure what the civil servants he was addressing thought of his remarks.
And
finally, Malcolm Brain swung into action with a comment that struck me as the
result of the employment of a scraping device on the bottom of an empty liquid
storage cntainer. Universal Credit was, according to him, terrible because people
getting a job would be worse off because they would have to buy clothes and
lunch. “Oh, so all unemployed people are naked and starving!?” I asked.
There
are still rough edges with Universal Credit and some issues to resolve. Some
changes will probably be needed as the system gets up and running. The overall
system however is moving in the right direction, making sure people are better
off in work. Labour in Gateshead simply hate the idea of another Coalition
reform that is working.
Most of our tabloid newspapers have now been delivered in the Whickham North and the Dunston Hill and Whickham East wards. Delivery in my ward will be on going over the next three days. So far it's been getting a positive response.
Labour are currently putting out "newsletters" in WN and DHWE. They claim they are "regular" - what they don't explain is that their regularity is once a year in the run up to elections! It's not just the Lib Dems saying that. Residents say exactly the same thing. They know an election is approaching because Labour have come out of hibernation!
(Photo above - Pinkie, my pregnant golden guernsey goat is houses in conditions that conform to CIWF views.)
I've been getting lots of emails recently as Blaydon candidate about lots of issues but one in particular caught my attention. It was from supporters of Compassion in World Farming which draws attention to the need to improve animal welfare and to reduce the amount of meat in our diets to improve health and make our food production system more efficient in terms of calories produced. The argument is that a huge amount of calories are lost from the food supply system when fed to livestock. For every 100 calories grown and fed to livestock, we get less than a fifth of that back in calories from meat.
This was something I fully understood when I set out to be self-sufficient 6 years ago. As a historian who researches food history, reducing meat production and increasing the non-meat proportion of people's diets was a key aim during the war and post war years. It was a lesson I've applied to my own self-sufficient food production system.
As I said to respondents, we can't force people to reduce their meat intake, but we can motivate and inspire them to do so and we can point to the health and environmental benefits.
As a result, I have reduced the amount of meat
I eat and increased the proportion of my diet that is vegetarian. I do keep
some livestock – goats, bees, chickens, ducks and quails – and I also swap some
of my surplus, especially honey and eggs, for other people’s surplus fruit and
vegetables. The aim is to build up a network of people involved in food
production which is sustainable and requires few food miles.
The points you raise about the calorie loss
caused by growing animal fodder crops is something I understand very well. I am
also an historian and have researched food through the ages. It is noticeable
that during the Second World War, when land needed to be used as efficiently as
possible, the amount of meat in people’s diets was reduced so that land could
be used for food for people rather than livestock. I have taken the lessons of
that period and applied them to my lifestyle and self-sufficiency activities.
One thing I would add to your comments is the
need to tackle food waste. In my household, we use everything we possibly can.
From potato peelings and egg shells to apple cores and bones, we make use of
what most people sadly now throw away to make further meals or to use as
ingredients in preserves and so on.
I keep a blog about my food growing activities.
You can visit it at www.self-sufficientinsuburbia.blogspot.com. My aim in writing it is to encourage others
to produce at least a small amount of their own food. We cannot force people to
change lifestyles and diets but we can motivate others to do so by showing the
personal as well as environmental benefits.
With regard to animal welfare, none of my
animals are caged though I do keep my quails in an aviary. My chickens and
ducks are free range and my goats have their own roaming area (often shared
with the poultry).
Generally, a lower reliance on meat in people’s
diet will help us to reduce the need for cages, help tackle obesity and reduce
damaging greenhouse gas emissions.
If I were elected MP for Blaydon, I would have
a much bigger platform to promote the very issues on which you have contacted
me. I will be able to do it not as a politician who tells others what they
should do, but as a politician who genuinely believes in the cause AND lives it
as well.
Please visit my blog and if there are any
questions you wish to raise, feel free to get in touch.
Thanks,
Dr Jonathan Wallace
Liberal Democrat candidate, Blaydon
I am writing to you as one of my constituency’s
candidates in the forthcoming general election to ask that you promote a humane
and sustainable farming system in the new parliament.
We need to introduce high standards of farm
animal welfare. It is time to phase out production that uses cages and crates
as they thwart the basic instincts of many animals to roam, forage and explore.
Animals should be kept in outdoor systems or, if
they are housed, they should be kept in large barns with ample space, plenty of
straw, natural light and effective ventilation. Genetic selection for fast
growth or high yields should be avoided if this results in compromised welfare
and systems should not be used if they require mutilations.
We need to encourage the adoption of balanced
diets with a lower proportion of meat. This would deliver health benefits by
reducing the incidence of heart disease, obesity and certain cancers; it would
also lower greenhouse gas emissions. Although more crops would be needed for
direct human consumption, this would be outweighed by a reduction in demand for
feed crops.
Farming provides valuable income to many rural
communities. There should be a particular focus on higher welfare production
that delivers a better quality of food and a higher income to those farmers at
the farmgate, benefitting both the farmer and the wider community through added
value.
Much livestock production in the UK is
industrial in nature. 60% of EU cereal is used as animal feed. For every 100
calories that we feed to animals in the form of human edible crops, we receive
on average just 17-30 calories in the form of meat and milk. We need to avoid
excessive use of cereals and put more emphasis on restoring the link between
animals and the land.
We need to promote diets that include less but
higher welfare meat in order to deliver a farming system that is less
intensive, with less reliance on fertilisers and pesticides. This would mean
reduced degradation of water, soil and air and lower use of water, land and
energy as well as biodiversity gains. It would also enable animals to be kept
to higher welfare standards.
Across Europe, around 700 million farm animals
(hens, sows, rabbits, ducks and quail) spend some or all of their life confined
in cramped, often barren cages. Cages should be consigned to the history
books and food production should be developed using extensive, outdoor and cage
free systems.
Sustainable farming that nourishes our health,
the environment and promotes higher animal welfare must become the rule, not
the exception.
For further information on these issues,
Compassion in World Farming has produced a Charter which sets out a proposed
future direction of travel. It can be found herehttp://www.ciwf.org.uk/charterand is supported by further details in briefing
notes, which can be found here:http://www.ciwf.org.uk/charter-briefing-notes
I hope you will feel able to support these
policy suggestions and work towards realising them – in the UK and by taking a
lead in Europe.
I can tick Marley Hill off the list - I delivered our tabloid in the village tonight. So in the past week, I've delivered 300 in Swalwell, 210 in Dunston Hill, 230 in Sunniside and 170 in Marley Hill. One of the main stories in it is directly relevant to Marley Hill - the final defeat of the opencast plans. So hopefully it will be a good read for residents, though a large number of them had already had the news about the opencast via our email newsletter.
I was invited recently by Whickham School (I was a pupil there from 1975 to 1982) to be interviewed as part of their involvement with BBC School Report. In it, the children run the whole programme from deciding the questions to filming, directing, and presenting the programme. The recording was this morning at the Media Centre in Sunderland University. I was asked a range of questions about why I like living in the North East, what makes an inspirational leader, what I have done on Red Nose Day in past years, why people should vote and to tackle childhood obesity. But the one issue they seemed most interested in was my goats!
Delivery of our latest tabloid in the Whickham area of Blaydon constituency is going well. Yesterday I lent a hand to get more out. In the morning I headed to Watergate Estate and delivered all 370 houses in and hour and a half. After lunch and a haircut in Blaydon, I headed to Dunston Hill to deliver 200. And that was where I saw one of those extremely rare sights - a Labour leaflet (there must be an election coming!). Actually, 2 Labour leaflets delivered together, one attempting unsuccessfully to try to be a local newsletter and the other from Dave Anderson MP.
The lack of any photos of the 2 sitting councillors in the one purporting to be a local newsletter is noteworthy. One of them is retiring in May and her decision to go (or was she pushed?) was mentioned only in passing. The postage stamp size photo of the Labour candidate with his "team" did not include them (I used a magnifying glass to check). There was a grudging welcome for the recently announced investment in Whickham School (though they fail to mention it is the Coalition Government making the investment). They report on plans for a new school for Front Street - we reported on this 2 years ago!
Labour's arrogant claim that they are "at the heart of our communities in Dunston and Whickham" may come as something of a surprise to the people who live in those communities. The low profile of Labour in Dunston Hill and Whickham East ward is more a case of hole in the heart rather than at the heart!
Reporting on old news and padding this "newsletter" with stories from outside the ward says to me Labour have insufficient knowledge of what's happening on the ground. Nothing new there.
The first Tuesday of the month is the night on which Sunniside History Society meets. In the past 4 years I've only missed 3 or 4. I was there last night and was almost mobbed by members as I walked through the doors! There were people wanting me to get street lights fixed, others wanted to know about the Marley Hill opencast plans, someone wanted to know when the next Focus is coming out and one lady handed to me empty egg boxes to use for my own eggs! I'm pleased to say that I won one of the raffle prizes - a box of truffles.
I have yet another bit of social media to operate. I've set up a website for the Blaydon constituency general election campaign. You can visit it on this link.
I was hoping by now that my opponents would have some interesting material out there on the internet about what they're doing in the election battle. Sadly, there ain't much there.
However, my spies in the Labour camp tell me that the Blaydon powers-that-be are looking for help to deliver a glossy leaflet that attacks the Lib Dems. We are keeping our ear to the ground to find out if it has started to appear.
The on-going saga of Dad's gall stones has taken a turn for the better. He was released from the Queen El;izabeth Hospital today. I picked him up and took him home via the Co-op in Whickham where I did his food shopping (he's not quite as self-sufficient as me). He's back at his bungalow in Whickham now.
I'll be at the Sunniside History Society tonight where lots of his friends will, no doubt, be wanting to catch up on the latest news about how he's doing.
The photo above was taken in his bungalow this afternoon.
Our latest tabloid is now being delivered in the Whickham area. We've produced two editions - one for the three Whickham wards and one for Lobley Hill and Dunston and Teams. The large pile in the photo above belongs to Whickham South and Sunniside and a forthcoming job for me is to bundle them up into their delivery patches. I'll get the patch where I live in Sunniside delivered first. I also have two patches to deliver in Dunston Hill and Whickham East to do as well.
Most of the Lobley Hill patches have been delivered. My colleague Cllr Peter Craig was in Lobley Hill whilst delivery was underway and picked up very positive feedback.
On Saturday evening we held our first community pub
at Marley Hill Community Centre. The aim was to get young families in from
about 6pm to about 8.30pm, and then people without kids in the later hours. It
was a tremendous success with the families. They were there 10 minutes before
we officially opened until about 9pm. Dozens of kids running round the main
hall where we had set up the play equipment. Parents loved it as they could go
out locally without having to get baby sitters. They could meet up with friends
and neighbours and relax with a drink.
The later part of the evening had only a small
number of people coming along. We need to try to get this onto people’s radar
screens to get the visitor numbers up. Nevertheless, as a first event, it seems
to have worked reasonably well. The next is on 28th March – and then
every final Saturday of the month until the end of the year.
I had a meeting of Corporate Resources Overview and Scrutiny Committee this morning. On the agenda we had
an item about the council’s website. The officer giving the presentation said that a revamp was needed.
He referred to the Newham Council site which had 70,000 residents signed up to
it who receive an email newsletter. I pointed out that 10 years ago, I was “banging
on” about needing to communicate directly with residents via an email
newsletter in a similar way to the eFocus I produce. I also suggested council
meetings could be streamed live via YouTube. We would not need to buy any new
equipment and existing staff already attending the meeting could switch the
ipad through which the recording takes place on and off. Whether or not Labour
Councillors wish to have their words broadcast to the wider world is an
interesting point. Whilst some of them clearly think they are incredible public
speakers, people outside the council chamber may well have a different view
after watching and listening to them speak.
Work is now starting on the long awaited rebuilding of Whickham Front Street Primary School. The site, on North View, behind the Gibside Arms, has now been fenced off by the builders. Building equipment is about to arrive.
The school recently celebrated its centenary but has been in need of replacement for many years. The school site is split and buildings are getting old. The new building will create the 21st century environment needed for teaching kids in the modern world.
And now to Labour's Councillor Paul McNally, who launched an attack on the Lib Dems on Thursday in Gateshead Council, claiming that the last Labour government's school rebuilding plans were cancelled and replaced with nothing. Perhaps if Paul were to spend a bit less time in the Civic Centre wearing very large suits and were to get out a bit more, he would recognise the inaccuracy of his claim. But there again, Labour never let facts get in the way of their narrative.
Yesterday we had our final Blaydon constituency action day of February, suitably on the last day of the month. 3500 letters were delivered, as were 1800 tabloids and 2000 Focuses. There were also clerical jobs in abundance to be done. It was Whickham North's turn to host the event so most of the deliveries took place there.
This was what I delivered in the morning. I was sent to do my old home patch in Swalwell (again!).
Some of the gang having a good read of our tabloid before heading off to deliver it.
In the afternoon we did some canvassing on what was meant to be the strongest area for Labour in the ward. Whickham North was Labour's top target for the whole of the Labour party in the North East in the local elections last year. Their campaign was a disaster, despite calling in help from across the whole of the North East. Our majority jumped from 100 to 300. Judging by yesterday's canvass, no recovery is in sight for Labour in the ward. This may explain why Labour's candidate from last year has abandoned the ward to attempt election in another ward (which has already rejected him once before when he turned a 600 Labour majority into a Lib Dem one of 200).
It seems that the Conservatives have now selected a candidate for Blaydon. Her name is Ali Griffiths and I understand she lives in Battersea. It brings the total of candidates to 5 in the constituency: Dave Anderson (Labour's sitting MP), Paul McNally for the Greens, Ali, or Alison, Griffiths for the Conservatives, Mark Bell for UKIP and me for the Lib Dems.
Dave Anderson is the only one I know or have met. He is pleasant enough to me on the times our paths have crossed. His politics aren't my cup of tea. He claims to be on the left of the Labour party and has attacked his own party's support for austerity. He is however quite harmless: he started the last Parliament carrying lots of left win baggage but never once voted against the Blair/Brown government. Despite the strutting and posturing, he turned out to be a New Labour poodle.
If it is the same person, Mark Bell was the UKIP candidate in my ward last year. He did not then live in the ward. He put out no leaflet and did not turn up for the count.
I know nothing of Paul McNally other than that he lives in the Derwent Valley and stood in Winlaton and High Spen ward last year (and did not win).
It is difficult to find much on Ali Griffiths. Most sites listing candidates (including the Conservative's own website as of last night) were still listing Blaydon as having no Conservative candidate. I've found a recently created Facebook site for her. I get the impression she is into skiing and someone has posted a comment looking forward to her going to Davos in Switzerland for a dose of skiing. Whether or not she has any genuine links to Blaydon is still to be discovered. Sadly for skiers, whilst we have lots of hills, the area lacks snow.
So Ali, welcome to the fray. And now that 5 parties have candidates in place, let the battle commence (though for the Lib Dems we've been battling away already for some time).
On Tuesday night, Dad was taken to hospital suffering severe abdominal pains. I visited him on Wednesday afternoon at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead. He looked quite bad and I was a bit shocked by his condition. It turned out he had gall stones blocking his bile duct. I'm pleased to say that he underwent a procedure today and the gall stones have now gone. I couldn't visit him yesterday as I had meetings all day (including full council to set the council tax in Gateshead) but I was able to visit him today and he is looking better but still has some way to go to be fully recovered. I told him we'd let him off delivering the next Focus leaflet! He told me that the ambulance medic who was first to see him at his house in Whickham on Tuesday is a constituent of mine who quickly realised there was a family connection between his patient and his local councillor!
I took the above picture today. He will have a few more days in hospital before he can return home.
I'm pleased to announce on Monday, 2nd March, I will be the new Lib Dem Group Leader and Leader of the Opposition on Gateshead Council. Our current leader, Frank Hindle, told the group at the end of the Full Council meeting in December that he was stepping down and wanted a new leader elected before the start of the local election campaign. So on Monday 23rd February, we held the leadership election. I won and as I was the existing deputy leader, this post was vacated and the group elected Ron Beadle as the new deputy.
Judging by the above video I need to get a motorbike (I've already got the leather jacket) to be leader of the pack! Anyway, below is the news release now circulated to the local media.
Gateshead Council Leader of Opposition Stands
Down
Frank Hindle,
who has been Leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Gateshead Council since
2011 is to stand down from the post on Monday 2nd March.
The Low Fell
Councillor announced his decision to his group in December so that there would
be time to elect a new Leader before the start of the local election campaign.
On Monday 23rd
February, the Lib Dem group elected Jonathan Wallace, Councillor for Whickham
South and Sunniside, as the new Leader. Jonathan was previously the Deputy
Leader.
In Jonathan’s
place as Deputy, the group has elected Cllr Ron Beadle from Low Fell.
“It has been a great privilege to serve
as Leader of the group and leader of the Opposition in Gateshead over the past
4 years,” said Frank. “These have been challenging years for the Lib Dems but
we have held our ground.
“Last year we held all our council seats in Gateshead and came within 78
votes of taking another from Labour.
“But the current Parliament is about to end and the next one will face
big challenges which will affect local government. I decided now is a good time
to get a new team in place to take the Lib Dem group forward over the next five
years.
“I am however looking forward to continuing as an active member of the
council – and to building up my general election campaign to be next MP for
Gateshead.”
Cllr Jonathan
Wallace said, “Frank has been a great Leader over the past four years. I am
determined that the Lib Dems will continue to punch above our weight and increase
our strength in Gateshead.”
Cllr Ron
Beadle said, “We have denied Labour their hope of creating a one-party state in
Gateshead. Over the coming years I will be working with Jonathan to ensure the
Lib Dem group on Gateshead Council holds Labour to account whilst growing our
support across the borough.”
Ends
Pr150205
Photo above:
Deputy Leader of the Pack Ron Beadle, me – the new Leader of the Pack, Frank
Hindle, standing down as Leader, after the group elections on Monday.
Our next leaflet for delivery in Blaydon arrived today. The printer dropped them off at my ward colleague Cllr John McClurey's shop in Newcastle and at 2pm I took the land rover over to pick them up. It was the only vehicle big enough to carry them all. They are now back at my house where they are being put into their patches.
Note the cardboard was not thrown out. It's going back to the allotment where, in wet weather, we will put it on the paths to try to keep the mud at bay. Note also the pallet on which theleaflets came is on the roof rack. For good lifers like me, pallets are sought-after resources. This one will be dismantled and used in making a goat house. Waste nothing!
Sadly for the Green Party, the media spotlight looks set to burn off their green shoots of growth and turn their little green garden into a desert. Even more sadly for those who genuinely believe in putting environmentalism at the heart of our own lifestyles, there is little that is environmentally sustainable about Green Party policies. Their spend, spend, spend approach may be attractive to those on the left who are clueless when it comes to economically and fiscally sustainable policies, but borrowing lots of cash to spend now is simply a way of taking resources away from the future. And that seems to be completely at odds with a stance that says we should reduce our environmental damage now so that we don't dump big environmental costs on the future.
Anyway, given my self-sufficiency based way of life, just on that alone, I bet I could out green any Green candidate the Green Party cares to stand against me
At Gateshead Council cabinet this morning, the budget report was considered. Labour are going for a 1.95% council tax increase, after four years of freezing it. Opposition Leader Frank Hindle, Cllr Ron Beadle and I were there on behalf of the Lib Dem group. As usual, some Labour members blamed us for every problem. For many in the Labour Party, history began in May 2010. All problems have arisen since then, not before then, they try to claim.
So after we were accused of causing increased suicides and mass unemployment of young people (which rather ignores the fact there are over 200,000 fewer young people out of work compared to when Labour left office) Labour Deputy Leader Cllr Martin Gannon pitched in with his comments. Martin has an amazing ability to force opposites together. Back in the 80s he was militantly socialist and then in the 90s became more New Labour than Blair himself. Somehow he survives as a rainbow "socialist" warrior taking up contradictory positions as each decade goes by.
"The cost of living crisis is a cliche," he announced. In the recent past he has normally attacked the Coalition for the "cost of living crisis". Today however he was voting to add to it. Perhaps he was just trying to admit, without saying it, that things are not any where near as bad as Labour makes out. My guess is that Martin's words may come back to haunt him.
Our latest edition (no. 93) of our email newsletter for the Whickham area was published last night. When I was turning my mind to what the contents should be earlier this month, I was struggling to come up with suitable stories that would, in a printed newsletter, be the page leads. And then suddenly, 3 big stories came along in quick succession: the end of plans for opencast mining at Marley Hill; rebuild for Whickham School and scaling back the cuts to Dunston Leisure Centre.
Sunday saw some of our team (myself included) head to Newcastle for a training session for candidates and agents. I'm not sure why I went for the agents' bit but it was useful nevertheless. We also did training on using social media and motivating volunteers.
Afterwards I headed to Whickham. My ward colleague Marilynn Ord had delivered 200 survey forms in the morning and it was my job to collect the replies left in letter boxes in the evening (from 6pm onwards). I gathered in 31. I expect some will also be returned by post. Volunteers at our next action day (this Saturday) will put the results into our database (whilst the rest of us will be canvassing or delivering).
It seems that UKIP are now beating Labour for activity in the ground war in the Gateshead ward of Lobley Hill and Bensham, though we are well ahead of both in terms of the literature we have put out. It does however seem that this ward is something of a UKIP target though it is also a ward in which we are interested. Labour have held the ward for decades but their vote came down with a thud last year. 10 years ago we nearly won it ourselves though after 2010, Labour's position recovered until last year when it went into freefall.
UKIP have now delivered an addressed letter to each household in the ward. I came by a copy this morning. Quite what the impact of both Lib Dem and UKIP literature will be is yet to be seen. It could be that the novelty of UKIP has worn off but they retain a goodly part of the vote they got last year. There is nothing in their literature to indicate they are involved in local issues. On the other hand, our literature clearly demonstrates that we are actively campaigning on what is important to residents. We have recently won the battle against opencast mining which, if approved, would have sent 60 heavy coal lorries a day through Lobley Hill. As it turns out, Labour in Gateshead backed the plans. Despite this, the plans have been rejected and there is to be no appeal.
Having local councillors who can demonstrate a record of year round activity is a key selling point for us in the local elections and we can clearly demonstrate this in Lobley Hill and Bensham ward. UKIP and Labour on the other hand will struggle. So with the battle for the local and general elections heating up, this ward is one to watch. And who knows, UKIP's presence, dragging down the Labour vote, could help us.
We had another campaign day today in Blaydon constituency. Some of us were stuffing envelopes for our next direct mail delivery, some of us were canvassing, and some of us (me included) were doing both. We were in Dunston this afternoon for canvassing which threw up a few interesting points: those who receive our email newsletter were much more likely to vote for us and to do so at both the local and general elections; for the first time in ages, no one mentioned my self-sufficiency activities; and a former Labour branch officer we found was not impressed with Ed Miliband. No surprise there!
Last night we held a pancake cafe in Marley Hill Community Centre. It was one of a number of events we are organising to make fuller use of the building. We held a similar event there last year which was modestly successful. Last night, we were run off our feet for 3 solid hours. The main hall was full of kids using the play equipment. The bar was opened up (we have a new license) but when all the tables were in use we had to set up additional ones, and everyone coming in seemed to have a great time.
The event was mainly for young families - and many turned up. However, there was a full age range of people there. And they consumed more pancakes than we care to mention! This is definitely an event to repeat next year.
We used eggs laid by our hens to make the batter but unfortunately, we are not yet able to use our goats milk for anyone other than ourselves. We will be registering soon with environmental health so that we can be inspected and, assuming we come up to the required standards, we will begin selling our milk and cheese. In the meantime, pancakes in the cafe had to be made using milk purchased from the local supermarket.
Friends of Chase Park in Whickham, with the help of Gateshead Council, have been developing a bid for £1 million of funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The bid is due to be submitted in early March. If successful, it would be a fantastic boost to the park and to Whickham generally. If the bid is successful it would result in
new features including:
WiFi capability in areas of
the park
New picnic benches and street
furniture
Gardens, community planting
areas and a community orchard
Interpretation Boards
New trim trail and green gym
equipment
A refurbished park space for
children
A new sports area space and
exercise equipment for all to use
Art installations
With timescales extremely
tight Gateshead Council have created online questionnaires for community
groups, primary and secondary school aged children to complete. The
questionnaires can be accessed through the following links:
All of these projects would be
available for community groups to use and to participate in their creation. The
project would also include a development worker for the park who would link
with education establishments and community groups.
The deadline for completed
surveys is Friday 27thFebruary.
It never ceases to amaze me how often Labour attack the leadership of the Conservatives and Lib Dems for having too many with public school educated backgrounds. And too often these Labour class warriors themselves enjoyed the benefits of public school education. People such as Tristam Hunt and Chris Bryant have rather wilted under the media spotlight recently when attacking others for their public school education whilst, ahem, having their own public school education highlighted by the media for all to see.
Personally, I don't give a damn what school you went to. After all, it is not your decision but rather that of the parents or the local educational system. But Labour's very own posh boys aren't going to let the facts get in the way of a good story.
Anyway, the point of this post is not Labour toffs pretending to be socialists, rather it's about my old school. Sadly for Labour they can't paint me as a public school boy. I went to my local comprehensive, Whickham School, back in the 70s and early 80s. The school is a very successful one. It's one of the reasons people want to move to the Whickham area. The buildings however are showing their age. The school was built for 400 pupils in 1960 and had grown to more than 4 times that number when I was there. Over the decades, more buildings mushroomed over the site. As they age, so the maintenance problems multiply. The school needed rebuilding.
And that is now set to happen. The school is one of 277 to go in the next wave of the Priority School Building programme announced last week by Nick Clegg. Excellent news.
Photo above - Cllr Chris Ord, me and Kevin McClurey outside Whickham School, giving the news of the rebuild the thumbs up.
Wallace Avenue in Whickham is a small street of just 4 houses but it is linked to my family history. It was named after my great grandfather Henry Wallace who was the first chairman of Whickham Urban District Council back in the late 1890s. He was also the first county councillor for Whickham on Durham County, back in 1889. There is another street named after him in Dunston though it is outside Blaydon constituency. Anyway, Kevin McClurey and I decided to have an impromptu photo call at the entrance to Wallace Avenue on Sunday afternoon whilst campaigning. One for the campaign photo album.
We had another action day on Saturday in Blaydon constituency. We shifted 3000 direct mail and 3000 Focuses in the morning. In the afternoon we were canvassing. The most interesting point we found during the door-knocking was the lack of enthusiasm for Labour amongst people who had voted Labour for years. Miliband just isn't cranking up the support. Meanwhile, as expected, there was a strong local vote for us. Also in the mix: we found one Labour member who votes Lib Dem locally, a Green voter and even a Conservative (whose party has not yet found a candidate for Blaydon).
Pictured above: Dave Fawcett back in HQ (Cllr John McClurey's house) adds recent survey replies to Connect with Luke Armstrng, our local organiser who is faced with a choice of eating chocolate biscuits or delivering hundreds of letters.
Above: my bag of leaflets and letters. Below: me on the border of Whickham North and Whickham East, heading through to join our canvass team elsewhere in the constituency.
For over two years I have been fighting plans to opencast a site in my ward to the south of Marley Hill village. UK Coal (now Harworth Estates) had wanted to extract a million tonnes of coal from the former colliery site and surrounding countryside. Last June, Labour in Gateshead backed the plans and voted them through. That was not, however, the end of the story. The proposed site crossed into Co Durham as well so Durham County Council had to take a decision on the application as well. And they rejected it.
Time has now run out for Harworth Estates to appeal. And residents are beginning to ask why the Labour Party in Gateshead were such enthusiastic supporters of the plan.
In my 28 years on Gateshead Council, I've fought 4 plans for opencast mining in or next to my ward. So far I've won four and lost none.
Photo above - me, Kevin McClurey, Cllr Marilynn Ord and Dave Fawcett at the handing in of the petition I ran against the Marley Hill opencast plans. And below, part of the area proposed for opencasting but now saved.
Today was a first in more ways than one. It was my first interview by students as candidate for Blaydon. And it was the first time I have met up with people to discuss politics in a Pret a Manger! The two students I met were from St Thomas More School in the constituency and they are putting together an article about the various candidates and parties for a school publication. There is no Conservative candidate yet in Blaydon so they interviewed the Conservative candidate for Newcastle North instead. They are yet to meet up with Blaydon Labour MP Dave Anderson.
It was quite an interesting and challenging experience which lasted for two hours! I was grilled on a variety of issues from (inevitably) tuition fees to gay rights and equal marriage. Hopefully they found what I said useful and interesting.
Meanwhile, my inbox has been flooded with emails about HSBC and tax avoidance by the rich. At the last count there were over 60. They are all the same wording but no explanation as to which organisation they are from though we can make an educated guess. Nevertheless, they are all residents of the constituency so I will be putting together a response to each.
Labour
have been slated today for taking onto the road a pink van to attract the
female vote. Variously described as patronising and sending out the wrong
message, to me it looks like a cross between Lady Penelope’s pink Rolls Royce
and the Mystery Machine, the van from Scooby Doo. Whether it will work in
attracting the votes of women or not is yet to be seen. I would have thought
putting that awful Harriet Harpoon in charge of it probably means the road to
socialism will be scorched with skid marks from hand brake uturns brought on by
the need to abandon unrealistic policies. There will, of course, be lots of
socialist pot holes ready to wreck the suspension of the vehicle. And watch out
for the road to socialism being permanently blocked by an overturned
milibandwaggon.
I
wonder what colour I should paint my Land Rover for the election? It’s usual
colour is natural mud with a hint of goat poo. That could certainly help me get
the “good life” vote! The photo above however shows it in a surprisingly clean condition.
Last week I was the guest speaker at the Whickham and District 41 Club, an organisation for ex-Round Tablers over the age of 40 (which means I easily qualify!) I was recruited to speak by a Whickham resident who had bought some of my free range eggs and was keen that I share the story of how I became (nearly) self-sufficient. So I headed down to the Gibside Arms in Whickham for a dinner and then attempted to set up my rather ageing laptop to give a powerpoint presentation. Alas, we could not get the laptop to link in to the projector, so I had to wing it instead. This seemed to go down rather well. Half an hour of questions followed at the end. Tony, the person who asked me to do the talk, is married to one of my former junior school teachers. He said she remembered me well. Given I was at the school 45 years ago, I either did something seriously good, or seriously bad, to be remembered so vividly after such a long period of time! Hopefully it was the former!
It may be the middle of winter but today the sun was shining strongly, a situation which brought my bees out in large numbers. The 6 hives I have at my main apiary were all busy. I saw them whilst feeding my poultry after Gateshead Council's cabinet meeting this morning (thankfully a short agenda) and before heading back to Gateshead for another meeting (on the leisure services review).
After that meeting, I again returned home, milked the goat, and then had to head off to Whickham for a meeting of the Lighting Up Whickham group which assigned tasks to various individuals for the Whickham Community Festival on 4th July. My jobs are to organise the baking and preserves making competition and to bring along some of my livestock for people to see. As one of my goats is expecting in late May, I'll bring along the mother and kids so to people can have a go at feeding them.
From the Lighting Up Whickham group, I headed straight back to Sunniside for a meeting of the Washingwell History Project. This was something I kickstarted a couple of years ago and we are now going through the process of applying for a Heritage Lottery Grant to carry out the work of recording the history of the Washingwell area.
So, 4 meetings in one day, all packed in like sardines. Thankfully, I can get on with some work tomorrow. My diary is free of meetings. Hooray!
I captured this photo from my allotment on Saturday evening, just after milking the goat. An amazing sunset. I spotted other residents of the area had posted up photos of it on Facebook as well though their pictures don't include the edge of a quail house and goat paddock!
We are deep into preparing our next mailshot in Blaydon constituency. On Saturday evening, Cllr John McClurey hosted an envelope stuffing event which resulted in over 3000 letters being prepared for delivery. Note the partially hidden bottles of wine. David and I brought along 2 bottles of our homemade plonk. It seemed an opportune moment to test out our Chateau Sunniside 2013.
I had to take a break from envelope stuffing to head down to the Whickham part of my ward. We are currently carrying out a survey of residents' views on a 20mph zone being introduced for the whole of Whickham. So far we have surveyed the relevant parts of Dunston Hill and Whickham East and Whickham North wards. Now we are rolling the survey out across the affected areas of my ward.
Last Saturday I delivered 400 surveys and got 80 back from doors. This Saturday I delivered 300 and got back 50 and yesterday I delivered 180 and got back 30. I still have over 1000 to deliver in my ward. As yet I don't have any figures for the number returned by post or for how many have been collected in the other two wards.
We are having another big campaign day next weekend and one of the jobs to do for those not going out canvassing will be to add all the survey replies to the database.
When we submit a motion for debate at Gateshead Council supporting something positive that the Coalition has done, Labour often move an amendment which wrecks the motion and makes claims of the Lib-Dems-eat-your-babies-for-breakfast variety. A couple of times recently, they used "information" they happily acquired from the Taxpayers' Alliance website to back up their claims that the Coalition spreads famine, pestilence and plague. Their opposition for opposition sake recently led them to attack the Coalition's decision to bring in free school meals for infant aged children. During the debate on our motion welcoming free school meals last autumn, they attacked the Lib Dems for taking away child benefit from the wealthiest parents and for raising the same benefit for other parents below the rate of inflation. Sadly for Gateshead Labour's sanity, a couple of days later, Ed Balls, in one of those rare moments when he could actually remember what he was talking about, announced that were Labour to win the General Election, child benefit rises would be below the rate of inflation!
But yesterday, sanity did prevail. For the full council meeting, we submitted a motion welcoming the announcement that there will be a free vote in the Commons on plain packaging of cigarettes and calling on the borough's MPs to vote for the change. On Wednesday, we had a message from the Labour Leader Mick Henry asking if the motion could be a joint one. We were happy enough to do that as long as we moved it. That meant I was able to hand them the task of seconding the motion. Whilst it saved me the task of writing a formal speech, I still spoke in the debate, welcoming the move but pointing out it was only one step along the road towards tackling smoking.
My colleague, John McClurey, moved the motion. He is a retailer but has extensive experience in tackling smoking and is a spokesman for anti-smoking campaigners. He brought along a number of plain packaged cigarette boxes to show people what they would look like. Many contain uncomfortable pictures of the effects of smoking.
The only fly in the ointment was Labour's Cllr Steven Ronchetti. The last time he spoke in council on smoking he attacked the smoking ban for what he perceived as the negative effects on pubs (he is a publican!) He said that though he would be voting for the motion, he wanted plain packaging to be delayed until after legal challenges had been completed in Australia. He seemed to be well briefed.
Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums in partnership with UNISON, Community Hubs Network and Newcastle City Council held an event to celebrate LGBT History Month on Monday at the Discovery Museum. As a member of the TWAM joint committee I was invited and popped in to look at the history display and listen to a number of speakers who talked about how laws and attitudes about sexual orientation have liberalised over the past 60 years.
Sadly, I was only able to stay for an hour as I had livestock to feed and a goat to milk back home.
This was meant to go out last night but I came back from collecting surveys last night with a painfully swollen foot which necessitated a hot bath to kick start the recovery process. For those numerous Labour hacks in Gateshead who follow my every move, I'm pleased to say the recovery is now complete and I will be back out on doorsteps again in the next day or so.
I have just finished and published my latest email newsletter to people who follow my self-sufficiency activities. It is a look back at 2014. So if you are into sustainable living, or just want to have a look at the non-political side of my life, you can read it on this link.
We had a Whickham action day today. It started with delivery of our latest Focus in Swalwell, my old home turf though I didn't do the patch where I lived from 1987 to 2002 (when we moved to Sunniside). Back to Cllr Chris Ord's house for lunch (pictured above). In the afternoon we headed out as a team to canvass in Whickham North. We found no Labour voters, 2 Conservatives (both at the same household and I remember canvassing them nearly 30 years ago when this area was part of my Whickham South ward - they were Conservative then as well), some Ukips and a good number of people voting for us locally and nationally and a further number of people voting for us locally but voting for other parties for the Parliamentary election. The split voting does not surprise me. We have endured this for as long as I've been politically active in Blaydon - ie over 30 years.
The biggest issues raised with me by residents had nothing to do with politics. My self-sufficiency activities continue to attract interest from residents. "How are the goats/allotment/bees/hens?" were the most frequently asked questions! I had a number of conversations about goat breeding, keeping pigs and how to use goats milk. Alas, all that time spent on swotting up on policies and key messages was not put to productive use today. Hopefully on the next canvass outing the questions will be as much about politics as it is about me and the good life!
I have recently been putting together the first edition of Parliamentary Campaigner for 2015. This is the newsletter/campaign manual for Lib Dem Parliamentary candidates. I've been the editor of it for 11 years. I included in the forthcoming edition a copy of the above table.
It is up-to-date as of this morning when the latest unemployment figures were produced. Yet another fall in unemployment means we have half a million fewer people out of work than in May 2010 when Labour left office. The other figures speak for themselves.
I am reminded of the Labour Councillor in Gateshead who, 2 or 3 years ago, claimed that Labour had left a "golden legacy" for the Coalition. The real world statistics suggest otherwise.
Lots of my constituents take a great interest in my self-sufficient, food growing activities so I've put together this short video looking back at 2014. It was a year in which we had a number of new projects, such as getting a milking goat and keeping quail. We also won a number of prizes at local agricultural shows and, as usual, made loads of preserves.
I had to leave the Lighting Up Whickham meeting early last night as I had another to attend at 7pm. This second meeting was the first of the Washingwell History Project. The catalyst for this project was a proposal by me a couple of years ago that the historic orchard at Fugar Bar be restored. I took this proposal to Sunniside History Society to see if they would be interested in leading it and very quickly, the proposal grew into a bigger project to record and publish the history of the Washingwell Woods area - which includes Fugar Bar.
Washingwell has an extensive history going back to the Romans. There is a Roman fort on the site though it is only identified by crop marks. The area also has an extensive medieval story to tell, based mainly on the former Fugar House (to which the orchard was attached). There was also a great deal of early industrial activity. And finally, the site was also the location for the last deep pit to be sunk on the Durham Coalfield. So there's lots to cover.
We are in the process of applying for funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The application will be submitted shortly. We will put in a separate application to environmental funds for the orchard. So, lots to do and to keep me occupied in the months ahead.
We had a meeting of the Lighting Up Whickham committee last night to kick start the arrangements for the next Whickham Community Festival. We have chosen Saturday 4th July as the date but the main discussion was around the theme. We had had some discussion by email in advance and I had suggested pets and animals. I would have gone for a history theme but since I have successfully pushed for the past two festivals to commemorate historic events and periods, I thought I would be pushing my luck to get a 3rd historic theme.
In the end however, someone suggested the 60s as a theme and we decided to go with that. We will be able to dust down our hippy outfits and engage in a bit of flower power. It was also agreed however that we have a pets competition and, assuming my goats have given birth by then, I'll bring along the babies for people to see. (The drawback is that moving the goats requires a large amount of DEFRA form-filling.) Someone also suggested we have jam and baking competitions for residents. As I have lots of experience of going in for these competitions at agricultural shows throughout the North East, I was given the job of drawing up some ideas and proposals for these competition. Sadly, that will preclude me from entering.
The snow started to fall just after the ward surgery in Dunston this morning but at 11am we met up to do a bit of campaigning against Labour's greenbelt grab. Labour want to take a section of land out of the greenbelt to the south of Whickham Highway and allow it to be used for over 500 executive homes. Lib Dems have been fighting these plans since they were first announced. The problem is that as Labour have such a large majority on the Council, on this issue they will get their own way. The battle on this is just about over and sadly, it is one Labour have won. Interestingly, Labour have tried to claim they are against their own plans, a trick they tried to pull in the Ryton area as well.
The photo above was taken this morning in Watergate Park, next to where Labour want their homes for the rich. Left to right, Kevin McClurey, me, Cllr Chris Ord.
I decided to have a go at putting the 7 Whickham Lib Dem Councillors' 2014 annual report to residents into a more interesting format. The inspiration for what I eventually produced came from Facebook and Google+ who automatically generated reviews of the year using uploaded photos. The Google+ version went one step further and added the music I use for the introduction and credits on my self-sufficiency webcasts.
As there are 7 councillors and 2 further activists to include, much had to be left out. This video is really intended to give a flavour of the work the Lib Dem Focus team does in the 3 Whickham wards and in Lobley Hill and Bensham ward.
So, here it is - Carry on Councillor: the Musical!
It's been a month since my last post. Various activities got in the way of my blog writing over the past 4 weeks. In that time I've made two trips to London and one to Barcelona (all now carefully logged and explained on my travel blog). We've had one full council meeting (more about that shortly). And we had to take one of our goats up to Northumberland to get her mated. Filling in the DEFRA movement forms took ages - time I feel could have been better spent on other things but one of the things I have learnt since starting to keep goats in 2013 is that there is a huge amount of bureaucracy.
Anyway, now that we are into the new year, normal service is being resumed on this blog.
Marley Hill Community Centre held its Christmas market today. It went well. Indeed, it got a bit too busy in the cafe where we were, at times, run ragged as we served up burgers, sausages, tea, coffee, cake and so on. As a member of the management committee, my job was to organise the event. I've also taken the lead in arranging for the community centre to have a new alcohol license so today, the Deputy Mayor of Gateshead, Cllr Alex Geddes, arrived to cut the ribbon to open officially the bar.
Whickham Wind were on stage at 2pm to play Christmas tunes. Sadly, we had no Christmas tree to light. Last year we planted one in front of the community centre. And then it died on us. This was quite an expensive loss. Meanwhile in January this year, Cllr John McClurey and I planted a Norwegian spruce at the community centre. I had been growing it in a pot in my garden in London for years. The garden there already has lots of mature trees in it so there's no room for new ones. So it made the journey up to the North East as a passenger on the back seat of my Polo after New Year. The tree is only about 1.5 metres high but it is doing well in its new location. Give it a few years and it will be taller than the building. Before it gets to that height we will use it as the new Christmas tree for Marley Hill.
The Whickham Christmas Market was held today and Santa dropped in for a visit. (See photo above of me, Santa and Cllr Peter Craig in a cunning disguise.) Santa's visit was not a brief one. He was there for 4 hours, with a collecting bucket, persuading people to part with their loose change for Planting Up Whickham, the group set up to provide the Christmas decorations for the village.
The market went ahead in a marquee on St Mary's Green but I gave up my table there to allow another person to use it. Instead, my table, supporting our drive to self-sufficiency, was outside the shop we were using as a base and as Santa's grotto.
I brought the tables from Marley Hill Community Centre to the market last night. It took three journeys to get everything back there this afternoon. It meant I was late for milking the goat which had to be done in torch light this evening.
Tomorrow, we have another Christmas market, at Marley Hill Community Centre itself. We have the Deputy Mayor coming at 1pm to cut the ribbon to reopen our newly relicensed bar. Whickham Wind will be playing at 2pm. Preparations are just about ready. I'm expecting to do another torchlight milking!
The Whickham Christmas market, organised by Lighting Up Whickham, takes place tomorrow so today I have been immersed in preparations. My main job was to collect the tables from Marley Hill Community Centre. It seems my Land Rover Defender, normally used for moving bee hives, goats and animal fodder, was the only vehicle big enough to transport 17 tables each 2 metres long. They are now in the shop in St Mary's Green which we are using for Santa's grotto. The market itself will be held in a marquee on the Green.
We held the first Christmas market in Whickham last year and it was a great success so we are hoping tomorrow will go just as well. It will be open from 10am to 2pm.
I've been Blaydon candidate now for a whopping 6 days but today I had my first constituency branch meeting. Lots of talk about the Autumn Statement and highlighting the successes of Lib Dems in government. There was also a discussion about ward campaigns. Obviously I can't go into detail though Lamesley ward cropped up a few times. The meeting was over at 9pm and I headed home to finish some self-sufficiency filming I started in the morning which had to be put on hold to milk the goat and deliver yet more Focus leaflets.
Coverage of the Autumn Statement on the news continued. I watched an interview with Labour MP John Mann in which he attacked the government for not getting the deficit down and moments later said that the government should build up more debt to avoid cuts in services. I guess I'm not the only person who thinks Labour's contradictory position is undermining what little economic credibility they have but John Mann really takes the biscuit.
Attention today was focused on Westminster for the Autumn Statement. There wasn't much left for George Osborne to announce, as most of the contents had already been announced by the PM and DPM from the edge of Stonehenge in a kind of pre-winter solstice dash to build roads and give more money to the NHS. Nevertheless, the stamp duty announcement took on the role of the rabbit being extracted from the hat. It was an interesting surprise for most people and a rather pleasant one for me. When I was working as a policy office for the Lib Dems in the last decade, I was the one who wrote the housing policy paper. That was where reforming the stamp duty system on house purchases was first proposed and today's announcement was very similar to what we proposed back then.
It's the second big policy that I wrote that has now been put into operation by Lib Dems in government. The other was the privatisation of Royal Mail. In the case of the latter, the final shape of the policy had some differences to what was carried out but the fundamentals were the same - that the liberalisation of the mail sector by the Labour government in 2006 meant that Royal Mail needed to be in the private sector to compete against the other private providers or face a slow death in the public sector, starved of investment.
What struck me about today's debate in the Commons was the unconvincing uturn performed by Labour. 4 years ago they were attacking the Coalition for trying to go "too far, too fast" in cutting the deficit. When it was clear that the initial plan to eliminate the deficit by the end of this Parliament would result in too much damage to the economy, the Coalition response was to be flexible and put the date back towards the end of the next Parliament. You would have thought therefore that Labour would have been saying well done, this is what they had called for. Instead, we now have the opposite. They are now attacking the Coalition for not cutting the deficit fast enough. It's a remarkable uturn made all the more incredible by Ed Miliband's forgetful conference speech.
Anyway, not all my attention was grabbed by the Autumn Statement. I had more focuses to deliver today, made all the more challenging by a frost that made some drives into ice rinks. I managed to avoid landing on my rear end when sliding down paths but it was a close run thing at times.
In a sign that winter is approaching, tonight we are experiencing our first frost since the start of the year. I could see it forming up on my greenhouse this evening. It was cold enough to put a coat on one of my goats. I bought it from an agricultural supplier for £30, which is only £8 less than the total I have spent on new clothes for myself this year! I'm not one of these people who feels the need to buy the latest fashion or to replace clothing at the end of a "fashion" season. Indeed, one of my favourite t-shirts is one I bought in 1991. It's still in good shape so it can still be worn.
Back to the cold snap. I'm not complaining about the weather. Quite the reverse. It's a good alternative to wet weather. When it rains I can't work on my land and I can't deliver Focus leaflets. Today was sunny and cool, perfect Focus delivery weather. And it seems Focus was noticed by those who received it. I was at the Sunniside History Society buffet tonight and a number of people mentioned to me that they had read it. And with eFocus being sent out last night, a number of people at the meeting were happy to talk about the contents of that too, particularly my selection as prospective candidate for Blaydon. The consensus view was that the general election had too many uncertainties to be able to predict an outcome. Personally, I think seats could go all over the place. One person said this could mean that the personality of candidates could therefore hold more sway than usual. The question therefore is, will people vote for an eccentric, bee-keeping, goat milking, poultry farming, food-swapping, webcasting historian!?
Anyway, I had a rather pleasant buffet at the History Society but I was thoroughly beaten in the name-the-historic-building quiz. Sadly, some of the buildings I got wrong had previously been photographed by me! Back home and I made a start on replying to the rather large number of replies to yesterday's eFocus. This may take some time.
The latest edition of eFocus for the Whickham area of Blaydon constituency has just been finished and published by me. Only 9 more editions to go to get to 100. You can read eFocus on this link.
I got my super new ipad from the Council last Thursday. On Friday it all went horribly wrong. No sign of emails or access to council documents. I had to be in the council this morning for scrutiny committee so I took my new gizmo in to the ICT officers who were a whiz at sorting out the mess I had caused (by using the wrong password). It waits to be seen how long it will be before I mess up the ipad again but I'm connected again to Gateshead MBC.
Back home and time to start delivering those Focus leaflets and using what persuasive techniques I can to get others to deliver as well. This is the first leaflet announcing my selection for Blaydon, under the heading "From the Good Life in Sunniside to Parliament." The first messages from residents arrived before I got home!
I bumped into a Labour member whilst delivering. He made a comment about my shoe leather being worn out. Very perceptive!
