Local council election - campaign blitz

[tangerine_sedge]

There's a by-election in my area for a seat on the local council. What's been totally surprising is the quantity of campaign literature through my door, and the actual door-stepping going on.

All 5 candidates have posted leaflets through the door, some multiple times, and the lib-dems and Greens have also been knocking on doors. In 40 years of eligibility to vote, I've had more contact in this one minor election, than all the previous ones put together.

I can only assume that there is such activity because it's under no single parties control, so a single seat may help them to keep/swing control a little.

Remember this is for a local council election, it makes me think that the next GE will be somewhat spicy!

[crofty1984]

Good. Our MPs should work hard for their vote. If it's hard-won hopefully they treat it as valuable and work hard to keep it when they're in.

[bigpriest]

tangerine_sedge said:

There's a by-election in my area for a seat on the local council. What's been totally surprising is the quantity of campaign literature through my door, and the actual door-stepping going on.

All 5 candidates have posted leaflets through the door, some multiple times, and the lib-dems and Greens have also been knocking on doors. In 40 years of eligibility to vote, I've had more contact in this one minor election, than all the previous ones put together.

I can only assume that there is such activity because it's under no single parties control, so a single seat may help them to keep/swing control a little.

Remember this is for a local council election, it makes me think that the next GE will be somewhat spicy!

As long as you vote for the councillor who is prepared to do things that benefit your electoral ward. Too many idiots think having a protest vote in local elections is sticking it to the man when they're just crapping on their own doorstep.

[tangerine_sedge]

bigpriest said:

tangerine_sedge said:

There's a by-election in my area for a seat on the local council. What's been totally surprising is the quantity of campaign literature through my door, and the actual door-stepping going on.

All 5 candidates have posted leaflets through the door, some multiple times, and the lib-dems and Greens have also been knocking on doors. In 40 years of eligibility to vote, I've had more contact in this one minor election, than all the previous ones put together.

I can only assume that there is such activity because it's under no single parties control, so a single seat may help them to keep/swing control a little.

Remember this is for a local council election, it makes me think that the next GE will be somewhat spicy!

As long as you vote for the councillor who is prepared to do things that benefit your electoral ward. Too many idiots think having a protest vote in local elections is sticking it to the man when they're just crapping on their own doorstep.

It's hard to know who to vote for, I might end up voting either Green or LibDem as at least they knocked on the door and attempted to engage me rather than just stuffing a leaflet through the door.

[pavarotti1980]

tangerine_sedge said:

It's hard to know who to vote for, I might end up voting either Green or LibDem as at least they knocked on the door and attempted to engage me rather than just stuffing a leaflet through the door.

No Independent? Always seem to be able to push more as they are not aligned to any particular ideology.

Last year my independent councillor who was excellent and really made a difference locally was voted out by some utter cretin from Reform who seems more interested in arguing on social media with the help of her mother than actually doing anything or even turning up to meetings. She has an equally cretinous individual in ex GB News sex pest (alleged) Darren Grimes in the next ward to help her too

Edited by pavarotti1980 on Friday 30th January 08:37

[bigpriest]

tangerine_sedge said:

bigpriest said:

tangerine_sedge said:

There's a by-election in my area for a seat on the local council. What's been totally surprising is the quantity of campaign literature through my door, and the actual door-stepping going on.

All 5 candidates have posted leaflets through the door, some multiple times, and the lib-dems and Greens have also been knocking on doors. In 40 years of eligibility to vote, I've had more contact in this one minor election, than all the previous ones put together.

I can only assume that there is such activity because it's under no single parties control, so a single seat may help them to keep/swing control a little.

Remember this is for a local council election, it makes me think that the next GE will be somewhat spicy!

As long as you vote for the councillor who is prepared to do things that benefit your electoral ward. Too many idiots think having a protest vote in local elections is sticking it to the man when they're just crapping on their own doorstep.

It's hard to know who to vote for, I might end up voting either Green or LibDem as at least they knocked on the door and attempted to engage me rather than just stuffing a leaflet through the door.

See where the leaflets were printed and then critique them on layout, font, and logos. It's the only fair way

[z4RRSchris]

Our locals simply go like this:

Tories: boot out corrupt labour and we will stop development (no you wont) and remove LTNS, and collect your bins every week (althought we dont have the money for that)

they havent realised half the borough dont have a car, or own a home.

[StevieBee]

bigpriest said:

tangerine_sedge said:

There's a by-election in my area for a seat on the local council. What's been totally surprising is the quantity of campaign literature through my door, and the actual door-stepping going on.

All 5 candidates have posted leaflets through the door, some multiple times, and the lib-dems and Greens have also been knocking on doors. In 40 years of eligibility to vote, I've had more contact in this one minor election, than all the previous ones put together.

I can only assume that there is such activity because it's under no single parties control, so a single seat may help them to keep/swing control a little.

Remember this is for a local council election, it makes me think that the next GE will be somewhat spicy!

As long as you vote for the councillor who is prepared to do things that benefit your electoral ward. Too many idiots think having a protest vote in local elections is sticking it to the man when they're just crapping on their own doorstep.

Yep. Exactly this. Party political influence on local matters is one-way and rarely in the interests of what happens on the ground locally. What your political preference is in a Westminster context should have zero influence on your preference at a local level.

You only have to look at the st show that is Kent to see this in full play.

[tangerine_sedge]

For the enquiring minds :


Conservative - 2x flyers printed in Southend-on-sea, staged photos. 1 flyer placing themselves against reform and the other against Labour. Not clearly branded, use of lots of colours and fonts. 2/5.

Lib Dems - 1x flyer printed in Southend-on-sea, staged photos, just the reasons to vote Lib Dem. Clear layout, consistent fonts and obviously Lib Dem (orange) from 6ft away. 4/5.

Labour - 2x flyers printed in Cardiff. 1 flyer is anti Reform/Tory with non-obvious branding and a bigger picture of Farage gurning than the candidate. The second flyer is a better layout (still too many different fonts) but passes the Labour branding 6ft test. 2/5 & 4/5.

Greens - 2x flyers printed in Southend-on-sea. Flyer 1 is well laid out, uses a consistent font, passes the 6ft brand test and hardly mentions the other parties. The second flyer is similar in style and content but has more pages. 4/5 & 4/5.

Reform - 1x flyer printed in Southend-on-sea. Strong on the 'broken Britain' messaging, with one side completely used to push national politics, the other mentions the candidate but is mostly unspecific waffle. There are 2 pictures of Farage (one being the largest), and as many pictures of SKS and KB as the Reform candidate. The flyer uses a suitable number of different fonts and passes the 6ft branding test (on one side it's Reform light blue, on the other is a large picture of Farage looking into the middle distance like a 1970's knitwear model). I've had to piece this flyer together as it's the only one my wife tore into little pieces - I think I might guess who she's not voting for One side 1/5, the other 3/5.



On the results of this entirely unscientific investigation, I'm torn between the Greens and Lib Dems. There's still a few days left before voting, so plenty of opportunity for a last minute print campaign...

Regardless of your politics, I think we can all agree that the Southend-on-Sea printers are the clear winners of this particular race

[alangla]

bigpriest said:

As long as you vote for the councillor who is prepared to do things that benefit your electoral ward. Too many idiots think having a protest vote in local elections is sticking it to the man when they're just crapping on their own doorstep.

I learned this the hard way. For decades Glasgow was run by a useless Labour administration that had grown used to being permanently re-elected and felt no requirement to serve its citizens. Eventually they were ousted by the SNP who very quickly became a useless administration who grew used to being permanently re-elected and feel no requirement to serve their citizens.

To be completely fair, the local (fairly recently elected) Labour and Tory councillors seem pretty good, but ousting the 2 pieces of useless lobby fodder that occupy the other seats in the ward is proving difficult and I’ve absolutely no confidence that a different administration would be anything better than the incompetents who’ve wrecked this city during their tenure.

I think I’ll stick to the advice above and vote for individuals rather than parties in future.

[bigpriest]

z4RRSchris said:

Our locals simply go like this:

Tories: boot out corrupt labour and we will stop development (no you wont) and remove LTNS, and collect your bins every week (althought we dont have the money for that)

they havent realised half the borough dont have a car, or own a home.

Where I am in the NW we had land that was previously a golf course - Tories put the land straight into the 'houses, lots of houses, don't care about the impact on roads or GPs' category. Labour said they would apply for some protected status and they recently delivered on that, the land is now public access and will remain so. Dog walkers are happy. Sometimes local councillors don't always align with their party stereotypes.