Who's standing where you are?
Discussion
Scuffers said:
He is standing here... a lot of people here will still vote for him.Speaking of low opinions - my choices are as follows
Conservative
His wife on 50K as his assistant.
House searched and interviewed under caution after money was removed from his mother-in-laws account via the power of attorney by his wife to allegedly avoid care-home fees. Settled out of court, case dropped.
Never normally seen in constituency. Unashamedly religious and votes accordingly.
Pulled out of a hustings where he knew he would get a lot of grief at the last minute and went to the pub.
Green
Well meaning woman from the town who runs a local charity - has a somewhat naive view of the world where there is no crime, greed etc.
Like most greens, nice, but delusional.
Labour
See link above - claims online he ran a huge overdraft up, all bills were settled via a debt management company long before EMT took out the private prosecution.
Seems to have actually done far more for the constituents than the sitting MP. Is highly disliked by our borough council.
Suspended by Labour - said he may resign if voted in to trigger a bye-election. Watch how quickly Labour will un-suspend him if he wins.
Still seems to be popular here, despite the court case.
Lib-Dem
Nice enough chap, but may well finish behind the greens.
Is a teacher...
UKIP
Nobody locally know him - he seems to have been parachuted in by UKIP from London somewhere.
Organised a hustings, accused the other candidates of cowardice for not attending before it was pointed out it was in the wrong constituency.
Packed out a recent hustings with what appeared to be a load of heckling, loud bigots supporting him - he was perfectly nice himself however.
What a choice.
Edited by manic47 on Sunday 3rd May 13:55
With the local standing Tory MP retiring after something like 40 years in the seat, the Conservatives have selected the amusingly-monikered Tom Tugendhat to stand for them. I guess he will get in.
Every time I see a poster of him, I can't work out whether he is "Tom Tugging the Hat" or "Tom Tugging That"
Every time I see a poster of him, I can't work out whether he is "Tom Tugging the Hat" or "Tom Tugging That"
Edited by CAPP0 on Sunday 3rd May 14:50
manic47 said:
Conservative
<something about expenses> and his wife on 50K as his assistant.
Arrested after money was removed from his mother-in-laws account via the power of attorney to allegedly avoid care-home fees. Settled out of court, case dropped.
Never normally seen in constituency. Unashamedly religious and votes accordingly.
Pulled out of a hustings where he knew he would get a lot of grief at the last minute and went to the pub.
I'm guessing that this must be Peter Bone. He isn't my MP despite my locality but I am familiar with him from the local press.<something about expenses> and his wife on 50K as his assistant.
Arrested after money was removed from his mother-in-laws account via the power of attorney to allegedly avoid care-home fees. Settled out of court, case dropped.
Never normally seen in constituency. Unashamedly religious and votes accordingly.
Pulled out of a hustings where he knew he would get a lot of grief at the last minute and went to the pub.
I'm not sure about some of your comments.
I don't recall Bone ever having to repay expenses. He isn't mentioned in the Legg Report on dodgy expense claims.
He wasn't arrested over the care-home fees. Someone (presumably a disgruntled local government employee) complained to the Police. Bone was then questioned by Police but the CPS stated that there was insufficient evidence for a prosecution and no evidence of dishonesty. The civil claim between the County Council and Bone's wife was settled out of court. Bone himself was never subject to any part of that claim.
Edited by ralphrj on Sunday 3rd May 15:14
On the first point - you are probably correct.
It's something I read a year or so ago, I can't find anything about it so I've deleted it.
Again, arrested was the wrong word, should be interviewed under caution after his house was raided.
I've actually defended him to people around here, the whole issue of power of attorney / moving money to allegedly avoid fees was his wife, not him.
He's been unrepentant about it though (at least in public) and I'll certainly agree with him 100 percent that Northants Police were up to no good when they leaked various bits about the case to the press.
The whole saga was pretty unedifying, both for him and the police.
It's something I read a year or so ago, I can't find anything about it so I've deleted it.
Again, arrested was the wrong word, should be interviewed under caution after his house was raided.
I've actually defended him to people around here, the whole issue of power of attorney / moving money to allegedly avoid fees was his wife, not him.
He's been unrepentant about it though (at least in public) and I'll certainly agree with him 100 percent that Northants Police were up to no good when they leaked various bits about the case to the press.
The whole saga was pretty unedifying, both for him and the police.
Edited by manic47 on Sunday 3rd May 14:44
fluffnik said:
MarkRSi said:
Thing is I don't mind Clegg/Lib dems too much, but every other day I've been receiving crap from them saying "Only WE can beat the SNP", "Keep the SNP out!", "Alex wants to eat your babies!", "It's a two horse race between us and the SNP" etc. etc.. While the few things I've received from the SNP are saying what they'll try do for the local area without resorting to excessive mud slinging. I know I shouldn't judge on a few leaflets but it's making me want to vote for the latter... 
Alex Salmond has an excellent rep as a constituency MP/MSP...Just saying, like.
My seat is a marginal between Conservatives and Labour.
The current MP, David Mowat, is a Conservative. Labour is predicted to take the seat this time. Their predicted vote is up very slightly, but UKIP support is predicted to rise from 3% to 15%, which will probably see the Tories lose.
It is the nature of British politics that the quality of the local MP seems not to make much difference to polling. Mowat has been a decent and active local MP who runs regular surgeries etc. - far better than his predecessor (Labour MP) Helen Southworth, who despite being elected twice was so completely invisible I would not have been able to identify her. I suspect he is in a difficult position. The Tory hard-right Eurosceptic shift doesn't play well here, putting off Tory moderates - yet still he loses the right wing Tory vote to UKIP. I can't believe we will have an MP called Nick Bent! What a name for an MP.
The current MP, David Mowat, is a Conservative. Labour is predicted to take the seat this time. Their predicted vote is up very slightly, but UKIP support is predicted to rise from 3% to 15%, which will probably see the Tories lose.
It is the nature of British politics that the quality of the local MP seems not to make much difference to polling. Mowat has been a decent and active local MP who runs regular surgeries etc. - far better than his predecessor (Labour MP) Helen Southworth, who despite being elected twice was so completely invisible I would not have been able to identify her. I suspect he is in a difficult position. The Tory hard-right Eurosceptic shift doesn't play well here, putting off Tory moderates - yet still he loses the right wing Tory vote to UKIP. I can't believe we will have an MP called Nick Bent! What a name for an MP.
I live right on the border between Sheffield Central and Sheffield Hallam (on the central side). central is a fairly safe Labour seat (Paul Blomfield) in fact I think the Greens might come a fairly distant 2nd this time round with LD UKIP and torys all on a small number of votes.
Hallam on the other hand is very interesting. There's all sorts going on and the Labour Party have got themselves a very very smart and popular candidate to go up against Nick Clegg. Oliver Coppard is the chap, he's been campaigning like a man possessed, going after the key voting groups (especially the big student population after the tuition fees in 2010), getting to all the hustings plenty of interviews etc. he's seemingly everywhere in Sheffield at the moment, I've even seen him at Hallam Parkrun the last two weeks, going round in a respectable time too. More unusually though a mate of mine who lives in a fairly well to do part of Hallam constituency; a few weeks back he had a leaflet through his door supposedly from the ex Tory candidate from 2001 and 2005 urging him not to vote for the current Tory candidate - no mention of who the guy wanted the constituents to back, just asking that they don't back the Tory this time! Current polls put Coppard 2% ahead of Clegg with the greens UKIP and Tory all on small %ages I think. Should be a close one for Clegg (considering he got a 15000 odd majority in 2010!)
Hallam on the other hand is very interesting. There's all sorts going on and the Labour Party have got themselves a very very smart and popular candidate to go up against Nick Clegg. Oliver Coppard is the chap, he's been campaigning like a man possessed, going after the key voting groups (especially the big student population after the tuition fees in 2010), getting to all the hustings plenty of interviews etc. he's seemingly everywhere in Sheffield at the moment, I've even seen him at Hallam Parkrun the last two weeks, going round in a respectable time too. More unusually though a mate of mine who lives in a fairly well to do part of Hallam constituency; a few weeks back he had a leaflet through his door supposedly from the ex Tory candidate from 2001 and 2005 urging him not to vote for the current Tory candidate - no mention of who the guy wanted the constituents to back, just asking that they don't back the Tory this time! Current polls put Coppard 2% ahead of Clegg with the greens UKIP and Tory all on small %ages I think. Should be a close one for Clegg (considering he got a 15000 odd majority in 2010!)
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