Saturday, June 06, 2009

Manchester Labour: Campaigning Culture One Hundred Percent


Spent the morning and early afternoon at a Manchester Labour train-in and planning day. Very good to see that, despite the various completed, ongoing and expected train wrecks, the spirit is still strong with a near 100% turnout from the invited councillors, candidates, coordinators and campaigners. Some excellent work ensued, interspersed with just a little rather ridiculous blagging from one or two rather idle individuals.

Opinions vary on what should happen and what will happen next on the Westminster Horizon, and even on how bad the EuroThrashing will be around midnight tomorrow. Will it be third time lucky on the annual October General Election sweep? With Brown at the helm? Or overboard? Or will the impatience in some quarters "to get it over with" or "to not risk it getting even worse" be surmounted by the "things can only get better' DNA of the pre-triangulation, pre-Project old school? Interesting times.

I've also now got more detailed turnout figures for the Euro. Will post them shortly. Inevitably lower than in 2004, when we had hotly contested Metropolitan all-outs in Manchester and Liverpool, but could well be enough, along with the wide range of non-fascist protest options to confound the BNP.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Polling stastions I visited, the affluent white vote was about 60%
up on 2004. Down in Asian areas due to lack of normal campaigning and no local issues.

benchilltory said...

Strangely, i had to queue at the polling place on Thursday, never had to do that before.
The ballot box was full and it was difficult to get the ballot paper in,however given the huge size of the ballot paper this was no surprise.
i wonder what could be tempting the good folk of Benchill to go to the polls? Socialist Labour Party ( leader Arthur Scargill) perhaps?

Anonymous said...

It is rumoured that the St Johns polling station in Chorlton was thinking about getting an extra ballot box because of a higher than expected turnout. This does not bode well for Labour.

Chris Paul said...

Anonymous: Chris Davies worked the Asian communities vote in 2004 with his wretched "Vote Asian" communalism on behalf of himself and Sajjad. I don't think the Tories attempted a repeat of this.

But vote down in Asian areas? I don't think that will be the case any more than in other areas and other communities. Twaddle.

"Affluent white vote" - 60% up. Complete twaddle.

St Johns turnout bad news for Labour? Again twaddle.

The turnout is substantially down in Mcr (27%) and atrocious in parts of Lib Dem Liverpool (24% even). But that doesn't necessarily mean much on its own.

If BHT's implication is that the people of Benchhill were out voting BNP and BHT is right that isn't the best of news. But the ballots were unwieldy, the process was slower, the turnout was down. Believe me. Down.

Anonymous said...

Why does people voting in a Labour held area of a Labour City "not bode well" for Labour? Twaddle seems a bit soft for this anonymous's contributions Chris.

Anonymous said...

Actually I was playing down the turnout when I said 60%.
I visited many polling stations and they were up at local election level,with people indeed queueing outside, as a later anon said. Which is above the normal Euro.
You're indulging in wishful thinking Chris.Bite the bullet, Labour have had it at least for the next decade.

Anonymous said...

rochdale mbc result.
Con 8909

labour 8468

lib dem 8299

ukip 7141

bnp 4905

Chris Paul said...

37,000 votes for these five slates? How many for the other seven lists and one soloist combined?

Good to see Labour beating the Lib Dems on this ca half GE turnout.

The fact that none of the big three have double the fash is disturbing. But this is the atrociously run Lib Dem Rochdale MBC where megative misery campaigning are the rule.

Chris Paul said...

Anonymous 15:48. Who are you? Why should we pay any attention to these anonymous claims of high and low turnouts in these places? Are you someone whose judgement and knowledge is of some worth? Or just a pathetic and cowardly blagger?

In 1999 and 2004 the turnout in the likes of WR and Chorlton was very high versus the Mcr average. If there is a reduced turnout in Asian communities as one of you anons has claimed this is worst news for the Lib Dems given their reliance on the communalist campaign last time.