The majestic machinery of democracy is in motion down my way. I know not why. The worthy incumbent has simply and inexplicably stopped incumbing. He or her sharp acuity will be sorely missed in the excitement of the cut and thrust of debate in my local chamber pot of democracy. Here are the runners.
The Reform party and the Green Party have not bothered me. The other parties have. Labour and Conservative candidates coax me to vote for them. Mr/Mrs/Ms Shah (Lib Dem) tells me not to vote Conservative ‘cos its candidate cannot win. I agree with him/her/it and have voted Labour for the first time in my life (I am seventy). One candidate boasts they are the only candidate living in my Ward. While this could perhaps be true, it will not be true for voters in other Wards. In other words bollocks.
The party I might like to vote for has leafleted me but has not fielded a candidate: the Socialist Party. Well, I’m as socialist as the next chap. In theory it’s a very fair way to run the world. In practice it is impossible to impose on individuals who have their own objectives. To slightly digress, as a child I wanted to know about socialism, although I was so stupid I couldn’t have known the word or pronounced it. My diction was a source of dismay to my mother.
I asked my grandfather. He was sound on all matters bar religion. He said if everybody started equal and were given a loaf of bread, one recipient would eat it, another would save it and another would slice it and sell it.To be on the safe side I asked Uncle Henty. He asked me if I had noticed the queues at the post office and the absence of queues at the bank.
As an advocate of democracy, for all its shortcomings, I am reluctant to write anything on a ballot paper. It will be discarded as spoilt and there will be no record of my Stand for Socialism.
You may ask why I have voted Labour? Low council tax and when my wheelie bin was stolen it was replaced in two days, no questions asked. I have lived through Conservative and Labour administrations in my borough since 1984 and the former was worse than the latter. That’s life.
If a candidate lives in the ward for which he or she hopes to be elected as a councillor it’s worth stating – proximity to voters concentrates the mind.
There are two by-elections in Hammersmith & Fulham next week. Whatever the result, it’s not going to change the Council administration, but it will be interesting to see if the numbers reveal any trends.