Opposition on a knife edge

The election results in Gateshead last week were horrendous for Labour and disappointing for the Lib Dems. Labour dropped from 48 seats to 12. The Lib Dems dropped from 18 to 13. It means the Lib Dems remain the official opposition as the party has a single seat advantage over Labour. The Lib Dems' 13th seat, in Dunston Hill and Whickham East, was a tight race. Reform took the other 2 seats in the ward. The Lib Dem Councillor, Peter Maughan, who was returned had a majority of 11. Knife edge or what!? It did however sort out who would be the official opposition.

Another ward was in a similar knife edge situation. Dunston, Teams, Riverside saw Reform win all 3 seats but the contest for the 3rd place went down to the wire. Labour's Brenda Clelland lost to Reform by only 28 votes. Brenda had a reputation for being a hard working councillor and it was no surprise that she was the highest placed Labour candidate. Sadly for her, it wasn't quite enough to hold back the Reform tsunami.

Re-elected

On Friday last week, the election counts for Gateshead were held. I am pleased to report that I was re-elected alongside my two Lib Dem colleagues Marilynn Ord and Jonathan Mohammed. Marilynn topped the poll with 1711 votes, I was second with 1692 votes and Jonathan M was third with 1572 votes. So there were fewer than 150 votes between the three of us, indicating that most people voted for the team rather than us as individuals.

Sadly, the Lib Dems lost 5 seats in Gateshead, reducing us to 13 councillors as the northern Reform tsunami swept away some great councillors and campaigners. Labour suffered a huge collapse, losing most cabinet members, their leader and deputy leader and 36 out of 48 councillors. Reform started with no seats and are now in control with 38. As yet we have no idea who their leaders will be.

Back to Whickham South and Sunniside - this is my 12th term of office as councillor for the ward. Our terms of office are usually four years but this time it is a two year stint as we switch back from this one off all out election back to elections by thirds.

And finally, a big thank you to everyone who voted Liberal Democrat in Whickham South and Sunniside. It has been, and it continues to be, a great honour to serve as the ward councillor and I will continue to give my best to the role.

Reform plans to scrap net zero will cost Gateshead a fortune

 

A few notes on the back of a fag packet and Reform call it a "plan for Gateshead". Nevertheless, in that jumble of meaningless slogans, there is one hard policy that will cost Gateshead dearly. Reform claim that by axing net zero, they can save a ton of cash. The reality is something different.

Like many councils, Gateshead has taken advantage of the move to net zero. Solar panels on council buildings are a familiar sight. In the photo above, you can see the panels covering the Civic Centre car park canopy and the Civic Centre roof. The installation of the panels means the council is paying far less for  electricity. Why buy in electricity when we can generate our own?

The panels were paid for by capital reserves, government grants and loans (the council can only borrow from the government but interest rates are only around 3-4%).

Along comes Reform who have promised to scrap all of this. They will have to employ contractors to strip out the panels, an unwelcome cost to Gateshead taxpayers. Council tax will have to go up or other services will have to be cut to cover the increased cost to the council of buying in electricity. The council will have to repay the government for the grants used to install so many of the panels. And somehow the capital reserves will have to be replenished as the asset paid for will have been scrapped. (The auditors will look very dimly on wasting an asset in this way.)

Meanwhile, the Council's electric vehicles will be scrapped, just at the point when it is cheaper to run EVs than petrol or diesel powered vehicles. At a time of soaring crude oil costs and blockades, Reform want to make us more dependent on Gulf supplies of fuel. This is madness.

So, Gateshead under Reform will give us vastly increased costs for electricity, hand back cash to the government and and trash our capital reserves to say nothing of the damage they will do to the environment.

The story behind statues

Last night I chaired the monthly meeting of the Sunniside History Society at Sunniside Club. The speaker was Gloria Dobbin who gave a presentation about statues in the Gateshead/Newcastle area. She explained why the statues were there and the background of the people from history who donated the funds to pay for them. A very interesting talk and it has inspired me to visit all the statues she featured to learn more about them. However, that is a task to do later in the year when I may, or may not have time on my hands depending on the election today.

Eve of poll

There was no let up yesterday with Lib Dem campaigning despite it being the eve of poll. I spent much of the day in Saltwell ward helping to deliver leaflets and a target letter. I saw no sign of the other parties except for a single, A5 leaflet for the Conservatives, of all people! Across Gateshead there are 66 seats but the Conservatives are standing in only 14. I don't hold out much hope for them. There are not many certainties in this election but it is a dead cert that the Conservatives will win nothing in Gateshead.

Back to the Lib Dem campaign - I had delivered a few hundred leaflets by early afternoon. I then met up with the rest of the team delivering in the ward and then headed back home to do a few things agricultural on our farm. So, last day of campaigning before polling day went off without a hitch.

Tormenting the council staff

 

Google AI overview of the meaning of "torment": "Torment refers to an extreme physical or mental suffering, agony, or severe harassment. As a verb, it means to inflict such suffering or to cause severe worry/trouble."

The reason I have posted the meaning of the word "torment" is because the three Reform candidates for Whickham South and Sunniside have posted on the Reform Facebook page for their ward that they will "torment" council staff if they are elected.

Such behaviour is unacceptable. Staff should never be treated in this manner. They should be respected. In my 39 years as a councillor in Gateshead, I have worked with officers to achieve changes and improvements which my constituents tell me they want. Tormenting staff is not the way to get progress. And it is certainly not the way to treat people.

Better late than never for the Greens

 At first they did nothing. And then they had to act. What was once the cuddly Green Party has been wilting under the glare of media and political scrutiny. In Newcastle, concerns were swirling about anti-semitic comments made by a couple of Green candidates - Philip Brookes and Mohammed Suleman.

The BBC reports:

One post on Brookes' Facebook page included an image which branded Israel "a bunch of Polish, Russian, Hungarian terrorists killing Palestinian people for 76 years".

His account also published an image of an Israel flag being torn to reveal a Nazi swastika flag, and in a post about the war in Gaza said it "takes serious effort not to be a tiny bit antisemitic".

On Suleman's account, a TikTok video was reposted which claimed Jewish prisoners of war were willing to bury Soviet prisoners alive under Nazi instruction during World War Two.

Concerns about these two Green candidates have been circulating for some time and it was only earlier this week that the Newcastle Greens took any action against them by "removing their endorsement" of them. They remain on the ballot paper as the legal deadline for withdrawal passed in April.

Suleman and Brookes are not alone. Another Green candidate has also been dumped. Tina Ion is standing in Blakelaw and Cowgate in Newcastle. Her name too remains on the ballot paper.

Reform split, secrecy and exposure

Northumberland County Council is run by a minority Conservative administration. The official opposition are Reform. I'm not sure what the number of Reform councillors is as the Farage party has a habit of losing members. But I hear on the grapevine that Reform met recently in secret and voted against their own leadership. This is not something that can be kept secret for long. Everything was exposed at the annual meeting of the council yesterday. Reform councillors were seen voting against their leadership's nominations for various posts. What a mess. Fortunately Reform are not in control of Northumberland but let their chaos and internal wars be a lesson to everyone not to vote Reform. Please don't bring Reform chaos to Gateshead.

Final deliveries

We are moving inexorably towards polling day. So here's a short round up of what I've been doing. On Saturday I was in Ryton delivering leaflets aimed at squeezing what's left of the collapsing Labour vote. On Sunday there was an action day in Dunston Hill and Whickham East. I was there to help deliver Focus leaflets. Monday may well have been a bank holiday but I was delivering Focuses in Whickham. And on Monday evening, I was in the Lib Dem office printing yet more leaflets. This morning I had to drop off the leaflets I had printed. And tonight I will be out delivering.....yes, a load more letters and leaflets!

Delivering in Ryton

Ryton ward in western Gateshead was my destination today. I was there yesterday as well, delivering our Labour and Reform squeeze leaflets. Between the two of us on the patch we delivered 500. Not bad for a morning's work.

Christmas donkeys 7 months early

At 10.30pm on Wednesday evening, I had just finished my dinner and just watched one of my favourite episodes of Dr Who (Genesis of the Daleks) when the phone rang. It was a resident of Streetgate, advising me that there were three donkeys on his drive! He asked me if I knew who owned them. The only donkeys in the Streetgate area are housed in stables near my farm. I guessed they had escaped from there and had followed the bridlepath to Streetgate. I phoned the owner who immediately headed to the stables though it was a half hour drive.

In the meantime, I walked over to Streetgate to find the donkeys, various residents and two police officers on the drive of the house where the donkeys had ended up. I explained that the owner was heading over but it would take half an hour to get there. The decision was taken to walk the donkeys back to the stables along the main road with one police in front with a torch and the police car bringing up the rear. I was at the front as well as I was the only one there who knew where to take them and I also had a torch. It took about 15 minutes to walk them back. There were, understandably, lots of twitching curtains.

Shortly after arriving at the stables, the owner arrived and got the donkeys into another paddock. Everyone then headed back home (with a story to tell!) and I got a ride in the back of the police car so I could give the officer directions on how to get back to Whickham.

The three donkeys are known as the Christmas Donkeys as they were booked last year for the Sunniside Christmas tree lights switch on (see photo above). We hope to have them back in November for this year's events, just not 7 months early!

Another missing Reform candidate

 

It looks as though Reform in Gateshead are suffering from another missing candidate. In Crawcrook and Greenside ward it was recently reported that Reform's Peter Gray has disappeared from the Reform campaign. Now, another Reform candidate appears to have disappeared.

Take a look at the above screenshot of Reform's High Fell Facebook page in which they announce their 3 candidates for the ward. Look at the first line: "our 3 candidates". But there are only two candidates featured. On the Council's statement of nominations, Danielle Cavanagh is listed as a Reform High Fell candidate, alongside her two colleagues pictured above. So why the disappearance from the Reform campaign? 

As with Peter Gray, there has been no public announcement about Ms Cavanagh so we are left to speculate about what's happened. As with Peter Gray, and Reform's BNP candidate David Prior, Cavanagh remains of the ballot whether she likes it or not. The deadline for withdrawal has been and gone. So stepping back or resigning from the campaign, or as with Prior, having been sacked, makes no difference. They are all still on the ballot papers and each one could potentially be elected (watch out for the by-elections).

The absence of Cavanagh from the Reform publicity may just be an oversight. An accident. A cock up. Or she may have stepped back from the campaign because she is unhappy with what's happening. Maybe she finds the campaign hard going or perhaps it was something of a mistake to stand. Perhaps she has seen what has happened to people with a past that has resurfaced.

The people of High Fell need to know what Cavanagh's status is. And if elected, does she intend staying on as a councillor or does she will she resign and cause a rather expensive by-election?

Voted!

 

I am signed up for a postal vote so although polling day is on Thursday 7th May, I've already completed my ballot paper. It will go into the post tomorrow.

This is probably the longest ballot paper I've ever had. We have the unusual situation of all seats on Gateshead Council being up for grabs plus there are lots more parties contesting elections. Hence the reason for the ballot paper doing a creditable performance as wallpaper.

Not flying the flag

 

Over the weekend, the above leaflet was delivered in my ward, along with lots of other leaflets about gardening services and pizza home delivery. The back page is shown above. Disregarding the completely incorrect imprint, people were encouraged to display the poster. I have seen one across the whole ward. It seems the flags aren't out for Reform.

Magazine delivered

 

I am delighted to announce that we finished delivery of our election magazine today! The whole of the ward is now done.