The best man for the job, or Derby winner...?

I have just been looking at one of the Lib Dems recent election leaflets, for the Shamblehurst by-election in Hedge End.

In it they list "three good reasons" to vote for their candidate, amid which is the assertion that the Independents come last here in Hedge End.

Actually, in the 2011 Town Council elections, the two Independents that stood did rather better than the Lib Dems are prepared to admit.

Cllr Keith Day was successfully returned to the Town Council, representing the Wildern ward and is doing a grand job, as you can see from his blog. Jenny Schwausch only just missed out in Grange Park East, by 16 votes.

So that was one obvious flaw with the Lib Dems argument, but I also noticed that the Lib Dems "three good reasons" for voting for their candidate told me nothing whatsoever about the personality, character, philosophy, experience or attitude of their candidate. Read it yourself if you still have that leaflet, and I think you'll see what I mean.

It is a problem that occurs regularly in the Lib Dems leafleting. I've noticed over the last few years that we are usually told very little about their candidate. There's a lot of negative campaigning, a lot of Tory-bashing, a lot of yellow flag-waving, but precious little of the information upon which we should really be basing our decision in the polling booth.

Further evidence for this is that the Lib Dems wouldn't even let their candidate participate in the interviews that have recently been posted on Cllr Day's blog. Please note that Richard Effany has not been omitted deliberately by Cllr Day. He was prevented from participating by the Lib Dem campaign team in Eastleigh...

For the record, the Lib Dems "three good reasons" for voting for Richard Effany were;

1. Only the Liberal Democrats can beat the Tories in our area. Labour have no candidate. Independents and UKIP come last here.
2. The Conservatives have axed vital services at Hampshire - but are stashing YOUR tax in the County bank - they don't deserve to win!
3. Only the Liberal Democrats represent our area on the Borough and County Councils. EVERY local councillor here in Shamblehurst ward is backing Richard in this election.

Which translates to;
"You really don't want the Tories to be elected. No, really you don't. We're the only party that can stop them and have a great track record of doing so. Our two remaining Councillors in Shamblehurst ward think Richard is a jolly nice chap"

Now I don't think that is anything like a good enough reason to vote for the Lib Dem candidate. I would want to know a lot more about Richard before casting my vote. I personally think we should be trying to select the best person to fill the vacancy on the Town Council, not back the horse that it is most likely to win the Derby...

But that's political parties for you. They are obsessed with winning and with gaining & retaining power.

Do you remember Labour's flag-waving in their quest for that "historic" fourth-term, which never actually happened in 2010, because we were all so fed up with them and their leader...?

I personally think we are on the verge of the same thing happening in Eastleigh and Hedge End. The local Lib Dems seem to have developed the same sort of arrogance that led to the downfall of Labour in 2010.

Perhaps we will see more Independents returned in future. If not me on this occasion, there will certainly be other Independents in future local elections.

From where I am sitting, the difficulty with being an Independent candidate is that we simply don't have the resources that the main parties have. Not just money. We miss the office space and equipment, the teams of people prepared to trudge around streets in February stuffing leaflets through letterboxes, the telephone canvassers and so on. Those resources make a big difference and give the main parties a huge advantage over the Independent candidate. It is why there are so few of us at the moment.

On the other hand, the best thing about being an Independent candidate is that I do not have a party line to follow.

I do not have a party leader or party hierarchy telling me how I should think, what I should say and how I should vote.

I do not have to defend the indefensible. If I'm not happy about something I can say so.

I am completely free to represent the people of Hedge End.

That's all I want to do.


Thank you for reading

Ray Turner
http://www.facebook.com/hedgeendindependents