Getting Labour Online

Southern Front research reveals that nearly half of Labour’s constituency parties in the south have no presence on the web.

Harriet Harman’s Guardian interview this week, in which she made clear that Labour would be fighting hard to make gains in the south in May’s local elections, and the NEC’s decision to endorse early selections in 18 southern seats both demonstrate that Labour is starting to look serious about winning in the south again.

At last week’s NEC meeting the deputy leader acknowledged that the party needed to “comprehensively re-engineer” southern constituency labour parties, especially those in the south west, to get them fit for purpose if Labour is to capitalise on growing discontent with the coalition parties.

A quarter of the 70 seat pick-ups Labour need to defeat the coalition government are in the south. Notwithstanding this parliament’s first two by-elections, May’s local elections are the first real electoral test for Labour under Ed Miliband. In what shape is Labour in the south, and how well placed is it to deliver the local campaigns necessary to make the gains Labour needs to demonstrate that it is on the path back to no 10?

It is indisputable that Labour needs to ensure it is active in communities right across the south, knocking on doorsteps, delivering leaflets, and leading community campaigns against the coalition’s cuts. As part of these efforts a website is a critical and essential part of any modern political campaign. It is a campaign resource that works 24 hours a day and reaches an audience that is difficult to put a message to by conventional means. Expectations will vary, with a bias toward social media such as Twitter and Facebook perhaps an obvious expectation of the younger generation of voters; however, voters across all age ranges are likely to expect their local political parties to maintain and keep up to date a local website.

Research carried out by Southern Front has unearthed worrying findings about the state of Labour’s web presence in the south of England.

• Nearly half of Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs) in the south do not have a website (93 out of 197)

• 13 of the 59 seats we won in 1997 but have since lost do not have a constituency website;

• 9 seats Labour lost in 2010 have no CLP website (Basildon South & Thurrock East, Bristol North West, Dorset South, Dover, Gloucester, Great Yarmouth, Kingswood, Portsmouth North, Somerset North East & Waveney);

• Over 10,000 members of the Labour Party are members in a CLP that doesn’t have a website

Should these findings really be a cause for concern? As one NEC member put it to me “my concern would be that many south west CLPs don’t exist in any meaningful level offline, let alone online”. The overwhelming majority of the seats without websites are in constituencies where Labour is in third place or worse, and has never won the seat before.

Without doubt, I think these findings should alarm us. They give an impression of local Labour parties struggling to recover from defeat last May, and of almost moribund parties unable to demonstrate that they are a part of their local communities, relevant to the challenges of local community life. In this modern technological age, what message does it send if the Labour party chooses not to or cannot maintain a basic website? It is the internet equivalent of a “closed for business” sign on the shop door.

Southern Front has five recommendations for the party, that we believe will help improve the party’s online presence in the south and enhance the party’s ability to win votes back to Labour;

1. The most urgent issue is to establish Labour websites in those 13 constituencies that we lost in 2010 that do not have websites at present.

2. In areas where the party has limited membership and no elected representatives, cross constituency party website should be established. A number of CLPs have already joined together to set up a joint website, often operating across local authority boundaries (Bournemouth, Swindon, Brighton & Hove).

3. The party should support efforts to establish a brokerage system whereby party members with web and internet skills can be put in touch with CLPs who don’t have the expertise within their own constituency. Party members across the country have set up some exceptionally good local websites and would undoubtedly be willing to help other CLPs establish their own sites.

4. The NEC should introduce a new position of New Media Officer within constituency labour parties, elected with other functional officers and responsible for ensuring that the CLP has an up to date and functioning web presence. Training should be made available through regional parties.

5. Finally, Labour should agree an objective of having a local website for every CLP by 2015, when the next general election is scheduled.

Integrating technology and social media into campaigning can no longer be seen as a gimmick or something to be left to tech savvy candidates. Technology is integral to modern campaigning, and every CLP and parliamentary candidate should, as an absolute minimum, have a functioning and regularly updated website. Labour in the south is some way off that mark.

Stuart King
Editor, Southern Front

Harriet Harman & Southern Indignation

Labour's Deputy Leader, Harriet Harman MP, gave an interview earlier this week with the Guardian, in which she talked about how the party is considering switching limited resources in an attempt to replace Liberal Democrats as the vehicle through which to register anti-Conservative sentiment in May's local elections.

You can read the interview here.

Plymouth Labour launch campaign to fight forest sell-off

Plymouth Labour has pledged to fight Conservative plans to sell Devon and
Dartmoor woodland all the way as the Government prepares to axe publicly owned woodland in the county.

Plans by the Conservative-led government to privatise the Forestry Commission’s entire forest reserve would mean local woodlands at Cann Wood in Plympton and across Dartmoor would be sold to the highest bidder putting the right of local people to enjoy them free of charge at risk.

Labour is warning that the Tory-led government wants to sell an area of public forests the size of Plymouth. Figures prepared by the House of Commons Library show that there is some 7,423 ha of forests across the county owned by the Forestry Commission – which is nearly the size of Plymouth (7,925ha). The Tories have form of selling public woodland. In their last 17 years in office they have sold 144,000 ha of woodland across the UK – the equivalent of 20 cities the size of Plymouth.

Cllr Tudor Evans, Leader of the Labour Group on Plymouth City Council said: “Having axed our warships in the dockyard and cut our schools and universities the Tories now want to sell off our local woods. This shows that there is nothing they won’t sell off to the highest bidder.”

“If the government is serious about wanting to preserve our woodlands as a place for recreation, conservation and enjoyment they need only do one thing – don’t sell them. The idea that private owners will not restrict access rights for the public or increase tree felling is simply nonsense.“

Luke Pollard, who was Labour’s General Election candidate in South West Devon which covers Cann Wood said: “The Tories want us to believe that selling the woods will somehow benefit local people – the truth is that access, conservation and biodiversity are all at risk if Devon and Dartmoor’s woods are sold. The only way to guarantee that Cann Wood in Plymouth remains free and open to the public is to stop the sale.”

“People across Plymouth and Devon want to save our local woods from being sold off by the Tories and we’re going to start a local grassroots movement to stop them. If the government thinks they can sell Cann Wood and sell Dartmoor’s forests without a fight, they’ve made a terrible mistake. Local people will fight these sales all the way.”

“Labour’s message to people who use the wood is simple – back our campaign and stop the sale. It is time we fought for our wood to remain free and open. We must stop the Tories taking an axe to our local forests.”

Plymouth Labour will be working with the local community to start a campaign to save Cann Wood and other woodlands on Dartmoor from being sold. Each year tens of thousands of local people use the woods to relax and unwind. If sold off to the highest bidder, we’re worried that access rights will not be preserved and local people will once again lose out.”

NEC agrees seats for early candidate selection

The NEC this week agreed to begin the process of selecting parliamentary candidates to contest 26 marginal seats at the next election. 18 of the constituencies chosen for early selection are in the east of England, south eat and south west, demonstrating the important role the south will play in determining the outcome of the next election.

The eighteen constituencies who will begin the search for their next parliamentary candidates are:

Open selection
Bedford
Chatham & Aylesford
Crawley
Hove
Ipswich
Milton Keynes South
Norwich South
Stroud
Waveney

All Women Shortlist
Brighton Kemptown
Dover
Harlow
Hastings & Rye
Peterborough
Reading West
Stevenage
Swindon South
Thurrock

Getting good candidates in place as soon as possible is important if we are to maximise our prospects of retaking these crucial swing seats. However, we need over 70 gains at the next election to secure a working majority, so it is a disappointment that we are not embarking on early candidate selection in a greater number of our marginal seats. Labour also needs to win again in seats like Plymouth Sutton, Brighton Pavilion and Kingswood if we are to return to government.

If Basingstoke were in the Pennines it would vote Labour

Adam Gray asks why Labour fails to win in southern constituencies that would vote Labour if they were located in the North

Accept for one instant the premise that Labour under Gordon Brown didn’t understand the South (and it’s a struggle not to accept). Accept for another that possibly, just possibly, Labour throughout its entire term of office did not. Those two contentions pale into inconsequence compared to the third: that the south has never, ever, truly “got” Labour.

Prior to the 1997 general election, a much younger version of myself sought selection for the Hertfordshire seat of Broxbourne. Broxbourne has a deserved reputation as one of the safest Conservatives seats in the country; regularly with majorities above 20,000. What is Broxbourne? It is some exclusive leafy lanes where some of the capital’s football players make their homes.. But it is also places like Cheshunt and Waltham Abbey running up the eastern spine of the seat – the A10 corridor: commuter suburbs.

Cheshunt is where I spent most of my time when I was seeking the parliamentary nomination there. It’s a typical southern town: not huge, not especially glamorous, plenty of open space not too far from anyone’s doorstep, house prices affordable by London standards; not especially affluent but distinctly averse to Labour.

In London, much of the North West, Yorkshire and North East, the sort of political profile housing like that of Cheshunt would provide would be a decent Labour area. In Cheshunt, even when voters were really alienated by the Conservatives and turned to Labour to kick the Tories they still did not believe the party shared their values. Never did. Didn’t then. Don’t now. And that’s why it was so easy for the Conservatives to reclaim all the ground they lost in places like Cheshunt – and right across the south in the 1990s.

Cheshunt is southern England. The story of the south of England is commuter towns like Cheshunt. Reigate. Bracknell. Staines. Swanley. Epsom. Bushey. Leighton Buzzard. Basingstoke. Areas that in London are Labour. Areas that may occasionally elect the odd Labour councillor. Areas that are all part of safe Conservative parliamentary constituencies.

Why isn’t Labour the instinctive choice of voters in seats like those I’ve mentioned? Voters who aren’t overly wealthy, necessarily highly educated, working in vastly well-remunerated jobs; who have the same fears about schools transport and leaving their kids with a better legacy than they inherited from their parents?

Before Labour works out how it can appeal to these voters the party should work out why it has always underperformed in the south. If Labour could win plenty of votes in affluent, middle-class, picturesque Saddleworth in the recent by-election why can it not do the same in similarly or less affluent parts of the South? I

t’s not just a policy issue: it’s a perception problem. Labour just isn’t “for” the South, just as in large swathes of the north the Tories long ago relinquished any claim to be “of” those communities. And for Labour, the problem is about being seen to side with those who aspire to do better. Labour does not - and because it does not, it does not win southern votes who want a hand up, not a handout.

Labour has fallen back horrifically in many areas that should be ours – look no further than Basingstoke: a seat that would have gone Labour in 1997 on its current boundaries (and almost did on its old ones): now with a Tory majority of 15,000. One example of many, but if Basingstoke was in the Pennines, it would probably be Labour right now.

Sure, Labour doesn’t need to win Basingstoke or plenty of other southern seats like it to form a government, but its job at regaining and then retaining power would be one heck of a lot easier if it was at least competitive here – if only because the Tories would be obliged to spend much more to hold seats they currently simply bank.


Adam Gray is a former Labour councillor and party organiser

From the frontline: Surrey Heath

Surrey Heath Councillor Rodney Bates explains why hard work in and on behalf of your local community is the key to doing better in “true blue” areas

Even the name “Surrey Heath” sounds Tory but within these deepest Conservative heartlands, there are a small group of councillors and a growing group of activists who are trying to put forward a positive Labour message. Like many areas, this can be a difficult struggle campaigning against the massive wealth and membership of the local Conservative Association and a well-known MP in Michael Gove. There is also a prominent Lib Dem group who would like nothing more than being the only local opposition and squeezing Labour votes even more.

Surrey Heath has only ever returned Conservative MPs and a Conservative majority council so it would be easy to say that we should write this and similar areas off for Labour and concentrate on more winnable seats in different regions. Indeed, the impression of many members living in the South East would be that the party has done exactly that with little or no campaigning in many areas for many years. For too long, many of our Labour supporters in the South East would have experienced no Labour leaflets through their letterbox, no one knocking on their door from the Labour Party, no local candidate to vote for at elections and no local Labour elected representatives for many miles supporting their issues. If they do pluck up the courage to attend a CLP meeting, they are likely to have found a dwindling CLP meeting complaining about issues of the past. Based on all this, is it really surprising that the Labour vote in the SE was so low in the 2010 general election? In effect, we lost communication and trust even with our own supporters who either sat at home or drifted elsewhere - mainly to the Lib Dems.

It should not be assumed at a national level that these voters will simply return. For many, the coalition policies have yet to impact on the more affluent South East and the party has wrongly allowed the false claim of “clearing up Labour’s mess” to stick. The Conservatives in the South East remain popular amongst many and will do so for some time. This is hardly surprising as they have nurtured a long-term communication with the electorate even in their tough times which we failed to do and they will be trusted for a while longer.

However, the same cannot be said for the Lib Dems who are beginning to suffer badly especially with their broken promises on tuition fees. Labour can certainly benefit from targeting their areas and retaking many of their votes which should be ours anyway.

To rebuild in the South, we firstly need to shake off those years where we have been the forgotten party to many. Until voters see us working in their area, many of them will still not consider voting for us.

The first step is therefore to encourage all of our members to get involved in their local communities by starting up a resident group, Neighbourhood Watch or a campaign group supporting a service that is now at risk. Get involved in a local church or become a school governor, visit the local day centres or volunteer for youth activities. It means putting into practice our values of caring for others less fortunate and becoming known by our supporters and the wider voters as the champions for the local community.

Step two is to open up our Labour meetings and events and make them of wider interest beyond our long standing members. We need to think beyond our own party structures and ask simple questions like “Would a new party member have felt welcome here and understood what we are doing?” I am sure we have all been to a number of tedious procedural meetings discussing internal party matters but how many of those have included proper discussions on topical issues of the day and therefore engaging in the ordinary “pub-chat” of the public?

It is amazing how residents in my ward are more than happy to chat about their favourite X Factor contestant or the plight of their football team but mention politics and many roll their eyes and look bored. Until that is when you mention that the local day centre is closing and their mum will now have to go elsewhere and it’s suddenly a different story – they’re engaged now and want to know what you are doing about it and it becomes another opportunity to spread the Labour message. It means talking to people where they are and not expecting everyone to be interested in the same issues as us.

The final step is then the political one namely to spread our political values out into the wider community. By doing some hard graft in the community and setting up an inclusive environment, we can press forward with both a strong Labour message and candidates backed with the trust and support of the community.

The challenge of us in 2011 and beyond is therefore a hard one as it means going back into areas that we had almost abandoned. The good news is that every party member can play their part and bring the Labour values of fairness and equality into every local community and eventually into our Council chambers.

Cllr Rodney Bates is Leader of the Labour Group on Surrey Heath Borough Council and one of only five Labour councillors in Surrey.

Southern lessons from Labour's history

Can Labour learn from past successes in the South, asks Luke Akehurst.

Despite living in Hackney for the last dozen years, I was born a Man of Kent (east of the Medway) and grew up in the distinctly un-Labour milieu of Canterbury, with family roots in local politics in Gravesend (where two of my great-grandparents were Labour Mayors) and Dartford.

As such I grew up with a mild obsession with the complete absence of Labour MPs in my home county from 1979 to 1997. That fired both my political interest in electoral reform and in how we might make Labour more appealing to southern voters, something that was reinforced by stints as a parliamentary candidate in both Aldershot in Hampshire and Castle Point in South Essex.

The demographic changes that have reduced the number of constituencies in the North and increased the number in the South mean that winning in the South is not just a nice bonus associated with landslides, or a boost to the injured pride of southern Labourites like me, it’s essential to us ever winning power and doing anything for our heartlands. The people I represent as a councillor in deprived inner-city Hackney need a Labour party that can win Harlow, Hove and Hastings to produce the government they need.

Tony Blair proved that Labour can win seats across the south when we get the policies right, with eight seats in Kent in 1997 and 2001, and even more extraordinarily, seven in the far tighter 2005 election. This was helped by the fact that despite being educated in Edinburgh and representing a seat in County Durham, his image was one that seemed to chime with the self-image of southerners.

We currently risk a similar downward spiral to that we experienced in the post-1979 period in the South. With very few southern seats outside London (a city which is culturally completely sui generis and hence actually a negative association in the minds of voters in the wider South), and only a couple of those MPs in high-profile roles in the Party, we literally don’t speak as a Party with a southern accent. We risk not being alive to the economic and political concerns of the South so we don’t address them, we lose further ground, and the spiral continues.

Quite aside from it being unhealthy for a party that aspires to govern to be such a weak force in three entire regions of the country (South East, South West and Eastern) it is particularly damaging when these are the most economically vibrant and demographically growing regions. It’s exactly the rust belt vs. sun belt issue that has often scuppered the Democrats in the USA (though I accept climatic factors make the analogy between Margate and Miami Beach difficult to sustain).

To escape from this spiral we need to find a way to make sure Labour can win some seats and keep a voice in the “deep south” – Kent, Sussex, Essex – even in a year when we lose nationally.

Oxford East is obviously a fantastic current organisational model – victory by sheer hard graft as they had some of the highest canvassing contact levels in the UK – but may not easily translate to the North Kent seats as Oxford has a demographic mix they don’t, due to the presence of two universities, a settled BME population and a major car factory. In addition, the opposition in Oxford East was the Lib Dems whereas in all the Kent seats the politics is skewed a lot more to the right, with Tory opponents.

Go back prior to 1979 though and we didn’t always lose all our Kent seats when we were in opposition. Labour’s Sydney Irving held Dartford throughout the Eden, MacMillan and Home years. Rochester & Chatham was held in 1951 and 1955 and only lost in the 1959 landslide. Even more surprisingly Percy Wells and Terence Boston held Faversham (which then included Sittingbourne and Sheppey) for the entire period from 1945 to 1970.

A quick Google search tells you how we held this unlikely Labour bastion by margins of 562 in 1951, 59 in 1955, and with an against-the-tide increase to 253 in 1959 (won under the local slogan “Make it More than 59 in ’59”).

There’s an essay online called Faversham Labour Party 1918-1994 by Lawrence Black of London Guildhall University. The sub-heading is the give-away: “The Best-Organised Constituency in Britain” (a quote from Tony Benn in a 1964 by-election in the seat).

Here are some of the choice quotes:

• “it had a vibrant and entrenched Labour culture”

• “In 1964 with a membership of 5,629 Faversham was the third largest Labour Party in Britain”

• “approaching one in ten of the electors... were Labour members”

• “the Party maintained eight Labour halls”

• “gross income was around £25,000 [at 1960s prices!] in the early 1960s”

• A tote lottery was the “main source of income from which the Agent was paid”, raising £19,000 in 1957

• “150 members acted as ...tote collectors”

• The Annual August Fete was a “notable date in the local, as well as Labour calendar”, opened by national politicians and celebrities and attracting 16,000 visitors

• “the social aspect of politics” was “more than a means to garner political goodwill”, during WW2 it ensured the CLP “maintained its organisation and kept its powder dry”

• The CLP “Annual Dinner was a most glittering social occasion” which on one occasion was held in Margate because so many people wanted to hear Gaitskell speak there was no venue big enough in the constituency.

Lawrence Black sees the seat’s marginality as driving its high membership because joining involved “a greater sense of purpose” than in safe seats. He cites safe seats that at the same time that Faversham had 5,629 members had the few hundred we might expect now.

But the people running this CLP were not complacent. They warned at their 1957 AGM that “complacency and apathy are constant dangers we have to face”.

It’s worth reading the whole of Black’s paper to see how the CLP was built up over decades, the important role of its full-time Agent, and the sad story of its decline in the 1980s by defections to the SDP and Militant infiltration, followed by re-gain by Derek Wyatt under the new guise of Sittingbourne & Sheppey.

I’m not suggesting everything from the Faversham lesson is translatable into the 21st century – the National Lottery has killed off local Totes, and TV has made it harder for Labour social clubs to thrive.

But it does provide a reference point for CLPs trying to work out how we can win in unlikely areas of the South on a sustained rather than a once-in-a-generation basis. And that recipe seems to be that you need a steady source of income; a full-time Organiser to run fundraising (paying for themselves), recruitment and campaigning; and that to have a big, campaigning membership you need to have a sense of purpose through exciting elections and fun social activity. There’s no reason why every CLP shouldn’t have an annual dinner. There’s no reason why every CLP shouldn’t have an Annual Fete, open to the public – in small town Southern England the WI and PTA hold fetes so why shouldn’t the Labour Party?

These activities won’t start out big but nor did Faversham’s. They built them up through decades of hard work.

All of this is entirely in line with Ed Miliband’s aspiration for Labour to be a real force in local communities. More social activities, open to the public, presents the Party with a human face, not as a bunch of election obsessives.

Sometimes having the audacity to aspire to your CLP playing a major role in the life of your community is the only spark that is needed.

But it also requires the Party nationally to realise that to build local parties capable of winning and holding marginal seats on a sustained basis, we have to understand that sustainable CLPs need to be more than election machines mobilised every four or five years. They need deep organic roots in communities and an internal political and social life that keeps them thriving between elections.

Luke Akehurst is a member of the Labour Party National Executive Committee and a Labour councillor in Hackney. He blogs at www.lukeakehurst.blogspot.com

Rebuild Labour in the South through the Economy

Murray Rowlands explains how trades union grassroots activity has a role to play in delivering a Labour revival in the South

I believe a principal reason for Labour’s low profile in the south is its lack of economic profile in the region. This is reflected in a low trade union membership particularly in the private sector here. The absence of a trade union perspective means that in so many areas Labour is seen as an irrelevance to the needs and aspirations of those the Party are seeking to represent.

It is essential that two “souths” be recognised in terms of regeneration. Radice and Diamond in their Fabian tract address the south in terms of winnable parliamentary constituencies such as Reading and parts of Kent. The south they neglect and should be our concern is Surrey, much of Hampshire, the Sussexes, and parts of Berkshire. There is negligible Labour influence in these areas. These areas constitute a crucial industrial hub for Britain and it vital Labour rebuild here.

Take my area, covering Surrey Heath, Rushmoor, Fleet, and Sandhurst – the Blackwater area with 300,000 people. The industry and commerce it boasts could be found in many areas of the South. At one time the military/industrial complex, the Royal Aircraft Establishment was based here. It has since been privatised and the unionised manual jobs have largely disappeared into technological and scientific centre called QinetiQ where there is very little union membership. Marks and Spencer have a very large retail complex called The Meadows again with only patchy union membership. The area is served by Frimley Park Hospital again where union activity seems to be in the doldrums. As with elsewhere in the south there are scores of smaller firms, many in the hi-tech area, with negligible union membership. It seems to me then no coincidence that the total number of Labour councillors in the area for over a quarter of a million people is 8.

There is of course no magic bullet to remedy this situation, but something must be done if Labour is to be considered to be a national party. What the current wave of resistance in the movement to the cuts in services and jobs has revealed is that far from working together often the two sides of labour are deeply suspicious of each other. This is what I found when I played a part in organising a march in nearby Woking against cuts in services here.

At one time there were Trades Councils throughout the south. Many of these have withered and died reflecting a general decline in trade union support. They provided an essential link into the community for local trade unions. If we are going to rebuild Labour here I believe there is a need to open trades councils wherever possible throughout the region. Building on the need to resist Tory attacks on the living standards of working people trades councils could become the focus for labour activism uniting the two sides of our movement. They should include representatives from the cooperative movement working through its ideas of regeneration. The view should be – new recruits to trade unions are potentially Labour’s members as well. Reconstituted trades councils would highlight the growing levels of unemployment particularly among 16 – 19 year olds not in education or training.

Trades councils could play an exciting role in revitalising the Labour Party in the south. Where they are opened or reopened they should do so not to provide a talking shop for both sides of the movement, but to again make the ideals of labour relevant to the people in the region. The danger of the Diamond/Radice approach to Labour’s decline in the south is that its focus is on limited success at Parliamentary level. Even if Labour successfully regains seats here, they will stick out like red pin pricks in a sea of blue. Regeneration in the south must involve a grassroots recovery that should be assisted by active trade councils and proportional representation.

Murray Rowlands is Chair of Surrey Labour Party and Vice Chair of Surrey Heath CLP

A full slate of candidates

Here's a link to an interesting piece on Progressonline by Paul Wheeler, detailing why Labour needs to put extra effort into standing a full slate of candidates in May's local elections. Well worth a read. It's a topic we intend to comment on in more detail soon.

Kent County Council by election result

Congratulations to Emily Williams on taking Labour from 4th to an undisputed second place in this by election in the Tonbridge division of Kent County Council. While this is a solidly safe Conservative seat and that party's retention of it should cause no surprises, the near halving of the Liberal Democrat vote is likely to cause further alarm in their activist ranks.

How Labour can win in the South

This article was first published on www.don-paskini.blogspot.com on 14 October 2010, in response to Giles Radice and Patrick Diamond's publication, Southern Comfort Revisited.

A new pamphlet was released this week about why Labour lost the support of people in Southern England, and what it needs to do to win them back. It is written by a former MP, Giles Radice, and the former head of policy planning under Gordon Brown, Patrick Diamond.

This pamphlet is the follow up to research that was done after the 1992 election, which argued that Labour needed to modernise and stand up for individual freedom, against public and private vested interests, to show that the party could be on the side of those who wanted to get on, making responsible tax and spending commitments and promising to manage capitalism more efficiently than the Conservatives.

The 2010 remix has pages and pages about how immigration and welfare reform lost Labour support, the inevitable opinion polls designed to prove that the public agree with the authors, and concludes with eight "key messages". Some of these are statements of the obvious such as "Labour can only create a better society by winning and retaining power", or "Labour should try and recruit new people to stand as councillors". Some are rather more dubious, but you can kind of see what they are getting at. I sort of agree that "the 2010 leadership election showed the power and potential of community organising to reform and revitalise Labour", it is worth remembering that the candidate who devoted most resources to community organising actually lost, despite having the backing of the media, most MPs and the most money.

But the majority of "key messages" from the pamphlet are where the authors pretend that their own interests and opinions are representative of voters in Southern England. So we get recommendations that Labour must back the referendum on the Alternative Vote whole heartedly (although most voters in the South oppose it), and face up to issues that concern voters such as "the role of the state after the financial crisis" - a subject which, in fact, interests very few voters in Southern England, but which fascinates policy wonks who write pamphlets.

Perhaps the most glaring weakness of the "Southern Discomfort" pamphlet (although there are many) is that it doesn't actually look at where Labour did well in Southern England, and what we could perhaps learn from these successful campaigns.

Labour holds ten seats in the South East, Eastern and South West regions. In two of these seats, Labour's share of the vote increased - Oxford East where the Labour vote increased by 6.5%, and Luton North where it increased by 0.7%.

So let's compare Diamond and Radice's analysis of how Labour should win the support of people in Southern England with how Labour actually did so.

[It could, of course, be argued that these seats are not representative of Southern England. While there is some truth in that, it is worth noting that Labour did particularly well in Oxford East amongst the groups of voters who Diamond and Radice think that we need to focus on. Support for Labour amongst C1C2 voters was around 50%, and amongst DE voters over 60%. Winning support amongst these voters was essential in a constituency with 15,000 students at the height of "Cleggmania"].

Diamond and Radice argue that Labour needs to debate openly contentious issues such as immigration and welfare reform. In Oxford East, neither of these issues featured on a single leaflet, and I can't imagine that Kelvin Hopkins in Luton - a left-wing critic of the government's policies on both issues - did so either. Ditto for the role of the state after the financial crisis. Just because people raise particular issues in a focus group or agree with a statement in an opinion poll doesn't mean that it is sensible to campaign on these issues.

Here, instead, are some key lessons about how to win in the South and increase support for Labour, from the people who actually managed it:

1. Good candidates - both Andrew Smith and Kelvin Hopkins were personally popular, decent, principled MPs, prepared to vote against their party when they thought it was wrong on issues from renewal of Trident to the Gurkhas. While some MPs of all parties abused the expenses system to enrich themselves, Andrew has lived on Blackbird Leys council estate for more than thirty years, and Kelvin commutes from Luton to London daily, just like many of his constituents.

2. Hard work. Astonishingly, the Diamond/Radice pamphlet doesn't devote a single sentence to local campaigning or the importance of talking to voters in winning elections. Their analysis is entirely from the perspective of national policy-making. One key thing about active, local campaigning is that it reduces the influence of the media. Rather than trying to "triangulate" on pet topics of the right-wing press like immigration and welfare reform, personal contact with voters allows Labour to find out which issues really matter to people, and to take up and help sort out problems. If people find out about what Labour is up to in their area from their local MP or a Labour volunteer, they are going to be much more supportive than if they read the Daily Mail's view about what Labour's priorities are.

3. Oppose savage cuts. In Oxford, Labour attacked the Lib Dems for their support for savage cuts, and for their leader's idea of breaking up the NHS. This was fantastically successful in persuading people to vote Labour. It is not fashionable to say this, but I believe that in 2010, Labour would have won more support if we had been tougher in our opposition to savage cuts, rather than listening to wealthy journalists whining about how we needed to show "credibility" by pledging to cut services.

4. Improve and extend public services. Extremely few people are interested in discussing "the role of the state after the financial crisis". But extending recycling schemes so that people can recycle plastic, setting up playschemes for children, letting children swim for free and older people use public transport for free - all examples of concrete ideas for reform of public services which people put forwards, and which Labour won support by delivering. Even in safe Tory seats like Salisbury, people are receptive to policies like the Living Wage or universal childcare. (It's well worth reading the excellent article by our candidate in Salisbury).

5. Understand and call for action where the market is failing to deliver. On housing, childcare and social care for the elderly, Labour's failure to act meant that there was too little provision, and that which was available was often poor quality and too expensive. Local campaigners knew that parasites like bad landlords were wrecking communities in southern England, but government ministers blithely dismissed concerns and were more worried about the mythical dangers of "over-regulation".

In terms of political strategy, Labour should always be particularly focused on where the market is failing to deliver, because the instincts of the Tories and Liberal Democrats will always be to go against public opinion and refuse, on principle, to act to correct market failure. This allows for popular campaigns where the overwhelming majority back, say, tough regulations on slum landlords or paying a living wage to cleaners, but the right wing parties refuse to act.

This is only the starting point for a discussion about Labour's strategy over the next five years. Just because opposition to savage cuts, good candidates, improving and expanding public services and hard work were the keys to Labour's success in southern England in 2010 doesn't mean that they are a panacea for the next election.

For example, the advantage of having excellent, independent-minded local candidates is magnified when they have a team of staff and communications paid for by the taxpayer. In most Southern seats, our candidates won't have that advantage next time. On the other side of Luton, local candidate Gavin Shuker, who grew up in the town, managed to pull off one of the biggest shocks of the election - our new candidates should try to learn from his experience.

We need to develop new ways to get more activists involved in local campaigning, whether through community organising or other means, and build on Project Game Plan (silly name, great idea) to get more resources into local organising.

On policy, we need to gather new ideas about where the market is failing, and which public services need to be expanded or improved.

And there will be issues and challenges which are crucial in other parts of the South which didn't apply in Oxford or Luton.

But I really think we will learn a lot more from the campaigns and the approach of people like Andrew Smith and Kelvin Hopkins than from pamphlets like "Southern Discomfort". We need to recognise that Labour fought the 2010 election with official policies in favour of a points based immigration system, videos at airports of immigrants being deported, locking up immigrant children and trying to starve those without children to force them to leave the country, unemployment benefits which had been halved since the 1980s, medical assessments by private companies to force sick people off incapacity benefits, and £44 billion in spending cuts including bigger cuts in the NHS than the Tories were planning. Rather than helping to win us public support by addressing their concerns, our best results were found where our candidates didn't mention these absolutely abhorrent and shameful policies and instead gave people reasons to be proud to support Labour.

I don't know quite what more than this Diamond and Radice were thinking Labour could propose in terms of addressing immigration, welfare reform or a "credible" approach to reducing the deficit, as they don't deign to put forward any specific proposals. But we've already tried the approach set out in "Southern Discomfort", and that's why we only hold 10 seats in Southern England outside of London.

Dan Paskins blogs at www.don-paskini.blogspot.com

UK's 'red' and 'blue' regions

We stumbled across an interesting article over on the very useful Britain Votes website. The article explores the increasing political polarisation taking place in certain UK regions. While we don't find ourselves in agreement with everything that is suggested in the article, it certainly poses some interesting points and is worth a read.

Moving from third place to first - Building Labour's recovery in the South

Stuart King reports from the launch of Third Place First

The re-launch of Third Place First, the Labour campaign to win in seats where we are currently in third place, was the success it needed to be, as around 100 MPs, councillors and activists from the South met in the House of Commons yesterday.

Progress, the organiser of the event, did not disappoint, providing those of us who made the trip to Westminster with three excellent speakers. Andy Burnham spoke on how the party would support activists in the south; Pollster, Deborah Mattinson, offered an entirely necessary exposition on the sobering reality behind our current good showing in the polls; and the estimable Joan Ryan, erstwhile Labour MP for Enfield North, issued a warning of the dangers posed to us in 2015 if the hidden Conservative landslide of 2010 is repeated.

The arguments and evidence of all three of these speakers are critical to the way Labour campaigns to win again in formerly Labour seats in the South, and so deserve, indeed must have, wider currency. I’ll return to Deborah and Joan’s presentations in a further article, but wanted to focus on what Andy Burnham had to say.

Andy’s presence at the event was important. As Labour’s general election coordinator he can play an important role in ensuring the needs of Labour campaigns in the political south are not only understood at Victoria Street, but addressed.

There was much about which to be encouraged in what Andy had to say, but also one or two points that struck a note of concern. Most welcome was his announcement that Operation Gameplan’s “Reward to win” scheme – whereby local parties are rewarded with free direct mails if they meet certain campaign targets – is to be extended to all constituencies (it previously applied to target seats only). This provides a great incentive for all local parties, especially those facing local elections in May, to get organised and get active.

We also learnt from Andy that the PLP is establishing a scheme which will allow Labour MPs to twin with constituencies that do not have their own Labour MP. This is a much mooted suggestion that in the past has promised a lot and delivered little, but news that the scheme – to be known as “PLP to win” - is being coordinated inside the PLP by Hazel Blears, should offer encouragement that this time could be different.

Andy explained that his visit last summer to Eastbourne, as part of his leadership campaign, was the first visit to the CLP by a Labour MP since a visit by Michael Meacher in 1999. That is lamentable. Sadly, it is an experience that will be familiar to many other southern constituency parties. But it is inexcusable, even with a shrunken PLP, and I urge all Labour MPs – not just those on the frontbench, to get out and about right across the country.

One Labour MP from the South who was present raised a worrying concern that our already hollowed out regional offices in the south – who will have an important role to play in supporting local election campaigns, are already being redirected to support the impending Barnsley by-election and are likely to be asked to support the Scottish and Welsh election campaigns, which coincide with UK local elections. No one doubts the importance of Labour doing well in these elections, but the news headlines on Friday 6th May should be about more than just Labour success in Holyrood and Cardiff.

The other concern I took away from last night was that, although Andy extolled the virtues of early candidate selection and the importance that this can play in local success, there remains little sign that the party in Victoria Street is prepared to change its agreed approach. A plan for the early selection of candidates in 26 marginals doesn’t go far enough. The meeting heard from Joan Ryan that to win a majority of 1 at the next election we need to win seventy marginal seats back to Labour.

But it would be wrong to finish on a downbeat note. Most of those present last night were enthused as they left, encouraged that that the party is finally beginning to recognise the need to better understand the south and its voters. It is, but there is still much more to do.

Stuart King

Ten things Labour can do to win back the West Country

Luke Pollard sets out a ten point plan to win in the west country

The south west might not naturally seem core Labour territory, but if we are to win the next general election Labour will not only need to hold onto seats in the South West but also take seats off both the Lib Dems and the Tories to make up our majority. Along with comrades from Plymouth Labour (www.plymouthlabour.org.uk) here are ten things Labour can to do win seats in the West Country:

1. Take notice of issues peculiar to our region. As well as national issues we need to think local and ensure our policies pick up on widely held regional concerns not just a London-centric approach. Ask anyone in Devon and Cornwall what issues concern them most and it is likely that the price of water will be in their top gripes. Why? Because water bills in Devon and Cornwall are double that of the nearest water bill anywhere else in the country. Labour needs to address this issue and more.

2. Visit us. It sounds simple but the more visits from prominent Labour shadow ministers we can get the more media coverage we can generate, the more people the party can listen to and the closer we come to showing we really care about the region. We need more than we’ve had to date. The Leadership election shows that the Shadow Cabinet will draw big crowds of active members and motivate them to fight harder.

3. Rebuild from local government upwards. We cannot win back Parliamentary seats if we do not rebuild ward level representation. This means we need to use the May elections to win seats and build for victory in the next set of elections. In unitary authorities and all-out councils we need to show that the party will invest in success at a local level to win big at the national level.

4. Select early and select local. The earlier the party selects for local, national and European elections the longer we have to introduce our candidates to the local community and win their backing. Labour has a strange aversion to early selections. We need to shake this off, wherever possible, boundary changes permitting, to get our candidates selected and fighting the incumbent Tory or Lib Dem.

5. Fight compound cuts that will blight our communities. The south west is heavily dependent on the public sector for employment. The coalition cuts will hurt the south west disproportionately more than other regions less dependent on the public purse for jobs. The effects of these cuts are compounded by squeezing other public sector employers. Compound cuts will hurt all the cities in the region from Bristol to Exeter and Plymouth. Labour needs to recognise this and have a plan for tackling it.

6. The south west isn’t just about farming. It is tempting for those living in Westminster village to believe the West Country is like an episode of Countryfile writ large. Certainly, agriculture is important (and we need a good set of policies here too) but we have heavy industry, higher education, cutting edge industries, financial services and a brilliantly creative third and social enterprise economy too. A one-size fits all solution will not wash for the West Country and Labour should not prescribe one. Challenge your perceptions about our’s and every region.

7. Fight where we can win. In saying we’re not all farmers, it is fair to say that we’re not all Labour targets either. There are a couple of dozen seats in the West Country where Labour could and should challenge. We lost many good MPs in such seats in 2010. Parmjit Dhanda in Gloucester, Linda Gilroy in Plymouth and David Drew in Stroud illustrate there are seats we need to win back. But to do this we need to focus resources on where we can win.

8. Develop the twinned seat strategy. I fought what I referred to as a ‘surprise Labour gain’ at the last election. SW Devon was very unlikely to swing to Labour and indeed our vote was squeezed, but our activists weren’t only campaigning in this one seat – we had deployed into our nearest key seat to bolster activists there too. Indeed, Plymouth drew in activists from across Devon and Cornwall to support the campaign. Candidates in unwinnable seats understood what was at risk and answered the party’s call. We need a strategy that encourages key seat working, not just at election time, but recognises that this relationship between a target seat and an unwinnable is not a one-way transfer of money and volunteers. It needs to be a two-way supportive, nurturing relationship otherwise volunteers and money will simply refuse to move across boundaries and that won’t help any of us.

9. Incentivise and reward activity. One lesson we should all learn from the way Lord Ashcroft ran Tory key seats was that the carrot and stick approach can work. Labour used it too with the promise of large mailings and extra resources for those target seats who met contact targets. This worked and gave volunteers something to work towards. Incentives and rewards across the year, not just in the run up to elections, will inspire parties to put in place activities that drive contact with voters and campaigning activity. But let’s look beyond simple identification of L5Ys (to use some Labour activist language) and also look at incentivising media coverage, community engagement, volunteer recruitment and retention, skills and training activities too.

10. Lead from the front. Labour in the south west is a solid team with strong hearts, focus and energy. We campaign all year round without direction from the centre and are not asking for instructions. We’re a loyal bunch to the Party – and are eager to win for the party and for those who are suffering under coalition. London is a long way from the West Country, but it is a lot nearer if those leading our party remember us and support our efforts. Give us the tools, the policies and the dividing lines and we will deliver leaflets, make calls, knock on doors until we win. That’s what we do in the south west – we work, and we’re not planning on stopping.

Luke Pollard was Labour’s candidate in South West Devon at the last general election. He lives in Plymouth and works in the travel industry. Visit his website at www.lukepollard.org

Access All Areas

In the 1990s Keith Dibble was at the heart of taking Labour into ‘unwinnable' seats - and capturing them. Now, with Progress, he has relaunched Third Place First, the campaign for the party to rebuild its presence throughout the country.

The idea of creating an organisation to support constituencies where Labour had consistently come third was first discussed during the lead-up to the 1992 general election by a group of prospective parliamentary candidates in the Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire borders. In 2011 this will be relaunched at the House of Commons on 18 January.

Then, it soon became clear after being selected, myself in East Berkshire and candidates in neighbouring constituencies, that we were about to embark on an election campaign that was far removed from the high-profile battles covered by the national media in the key marginals. As a result we formed a cluster group of PPCs where CLPs and candidates worked together on joint campaigns, shared visits from frontbench spokespersons and showed a united front to the local press and radio. Between us we put Labour back on the local political agenda and, as a team, put the Labour case forward and connected with the electorate.

The outcome of this cross-constituency boundary working was above-average support for Labour in our area. In East Berkshire my vote increased from 9,287 to 14,458 and came within 800 votes of pushing the Liberal Democrats into third place. It had, however, become apparent to our group that for Labour to win the next general election, and claim to be a truly national party, we had to build a strong local government base in the south of England. That's why Third Place First was formed with the objective of increasing the number of Labour councillors in the south.

We established a team of activists who went out and spoke to CLPs across the region. We advised on:
- How to run a campaign on minimal resources eg £20 and three volunteers;
- How to produce inexpensive but good-quality newsletters;
- Why every seat must be fought;
- Having the confidence to stand for Labour wherever you lived;
- Showing that Labour can make a difference, even if you are the only Labour councillor.

In February 1994, Third Place First held its inaugural conference where MPs and leading councillors spoke to over 100 party members from across the south-east and south-west. Third Place First was becoming known nationally and the event was covered by Andrew Rawnsley and Channel 4's A Week in Politics.

A few weeks later in the May local elections, Labour gained hundreds of seats across the country, including many in the south and some from third place with swings to Labour of over 20 per cent. In June 1994, the party won a record number of European seats, again coming from third place to win.

A Third Place First summer school was held and we continued to train and encourage CLPs to campaign and work to maximise the Labour vote in their local area. Third Place First had now become an established network in the party. This was acknowledged by the national party leadership when we were asked to support John Prescott's Operation Toehold project, the scheme to secure at least one Labour councillor on every council in the country.

Operation Toehold, with the support of Third Place First, was a great success. In May 1995, Labour made further gains across the country, with dozens of local authorities seeing Labour representation for the first time in years. With the experience gained from Third Place First and Operation Toehold, the party was able to develop into a confident first-rate national election machine which resulted in further local election successes in 1996.

The combination of the key seat strategy, and the ability of CLPs and PPCs to turn local council election victories into national votes, resulted in 1997's landslide victory for Labour. With the party winning in such places as St Albans (+17 percentage point increase in the Labour vote); Hove
(+20 percentage points); and Hastings (+19 percentage points), Third Place First and other networks played a critical role in creating a Labour party which was, for the first time in a generation, the natural party of government.

Why was this achieved between the 1992 and 1997 elections but not 1983 and 1987?

One major factor was that, under Neil Kinnock's leadership, despite not winning in 1992, Labour had started to change the minds of middle England voters about the party. Kinnock's Labour had started to win parliamentary by-elections and local council seats and was beginning to look like a national political party that could win a future general election.

With Neil Kinnock stepping down after his second defeat, Labour's standing was even further strengthened in middle England with John Smith and, later, Tony Blair as leader.

At the 1983 general election Labour had shrunk back to its historical industrial heartlands, with the party falling off the local political agendas in many district and shire councils. In the following four years, Labour did have moderate success in local elections but there were still large chunks of every region without Labour representation. Therefore, in these areas, PPCs selected for the 1987 and 1992 general elections found it difficult to raise both their own and their local CLPs' profile.

That is why Third Place First and Operation Toehold made such an impact between 1992 and 1997. As Labour developed its local government base, the electorate experienced the difference local Labour councillors could make. Voters got into the habit of voting Labour in every election and stayed with the party until after the 2001 election.

So after our most recent general election defeat it is clear that it is time to relaunch Third Place First.

Nationally, Labour is back to its 1992 position. In the south-east, Labour has only four MPs and there are 31 local authorities without any Labour councillors. There is a similar, if not worse, position in the south-west and eastern regions.

Joan Ryan's Hidden Landslide article in the October edition of Progress showed how, in seats held by Labour as recently as 2005, we now lag far behind, polling third in some instances. In 2010 itself, we fell straight from first to third place in Watford and Bristol North West. But to accept these seats as electoral no-go areas for Labour would rule us out of power with workable majority for the foreseeable future.

Politics is, however, different now with the first coalition government in place for many decades. Labour cannot just sit back and wait for the coalition to break up and return to power by default. Unlike 1992, the party is not in the ascendency and our vote has dropped in every national election since 1997. Labour will have to work hard for victory.

Luke Akehurst was right to call for a 633-seat strategy in the September edition of Progress. But for Labour to return to power at the next general election, the party must not only win the battle of ideas and have the best policies to enable Labour to reconnect with the electorate. It must also have the knowledge, ability, organisational skills and, above all, the confidence, will, belief and desire to win beyond our core areas.

For Ed Miliband's party to regain power it must prove to the electorate that it is a truly national party and not just a party of the cities and industrial heartlands. It must:

- Ensure the party functions in every CLP;
- Rebuild its local government base;
- Fight every council seat and by-election;
- Win the battle of community politics to become the natural party to represent every neighbourhood;
- Campaign all year round - not just at election time;
- Show evidence that Labour can and does make a difference;
- Win seats from third place in seats such as Cambridge, Hemel Hempstead, Bristol North West, Watford, Castle Point, Reading East, St Albans, Wimbledon, North West Norfolk, Wyre Forest, Shrewsbury and Atcham and Leeds North West.

A relaunched Third Place First, working with CLPs across the country and proving there are no 'no-go areas for Labour', can help deliver the next Labour victory. Let's get started.

Keith Dibble is leader of Rushmoor council Labour group. This article was first published by Progress on 6th December 2010.

From the frontline: Aldershot

Jonathan Slater reflects on his experience as the PPC for Aldershot

As Parliamentary Candidate standing for Labour at the last General Election in the South East, it became clear that many of our supporters felt that the previous Labour Government weren’t listening to us anymore.

The most notable example was the abolition of the 10p which meant a lot of Labour supporters in Aldershot were paying double the amount in taxation and taking a double cut in their earnings. Also the increasing income gap between our supporters in Aldershot and those earning obscene amounts - notably in the banking sector whose frivolous excesses and irresponsibility that led to the economic crisis in 2008 which now the Coalition are blaming on the previous Labour Government.

Other issues though also played its part in which the previous Labour Government seemed to be on the wrong side of the political argument. One was those Gurkhas who had served in the British Army prior to 1997 not having the right to settle in this country. This issue had a big impact in Aldershot where most of the Nepalese live in the UK. When I did a petition on this issue in the constituency I was amazed by the unanimous support for giving all Gurkhas the right to settle, where literally residents were queuing round the block to sign when I had a street stall in the Town Centre.

Also the expenses scandal in 2009 meant for a time it was very difficult for any candidate from the 3 political parties to canvass at that time. I think though among Labour supporters that was a real anger against the behaviour of now former Labour MPs where they had expected better.

Finally immigration was an issue that kept coming back to me which wasn’t so much the issue around non EU immigration, but the number of EU migrants arriving where as a local community they felt unsupported in adjusting to increased immigration that had led to the perception of their own wages being driven drown.
In terms of positives, I was very fortunate to be supported by a hard working Labour Group of 6 councillors led by Cllr Keith Dibble. This proved invaluable to me as a PPC where together with the Labour councillors we able to campaign effectively on local issues concerning the regeneration of Aldershot Town Centre and turning former MOD property into more social housing. Also it gave me a campaigning base to build on where I didn’t need to start from scratch.

During the short general election campaign I did find recognition of what the previous Labour Government had done in establishing Sure Start and the increased investment of the NHS where Aldershot had seen the opening of Maple Vue and Owl’s Children Centres and the opening of the Aldershot Centre for Health. Also the leaflets which USDAW had produced for all Labour PPCs on what Labour had done for families and parents was very effective when handing them outside of primary schools and on the door step during the short campaign.

Finally standing as a Labour PPC in a garrison town meant that there was a lot of anger against the perceived lack of support for the armed services by the former Labour Government. This was completely not the case and when I came to be a strong backer of British Royal Legion’s general election manifesto I highlighted to residents in Aldershot including those serving in the armed services that some of the provisions had actually been implemented. This included making the NHS priority treatment system work for veterans with injuries caused by Service in the Armed Forces, and also the opening and substantial investment in facilities at the Headley Court rehabilitation centre.

In terms of lessons for the Labour Party to win back support we lost in the South East, I think first the Party needs to support our local councillors who provide the basic campaigning infrastructure that will lead to the Party’s recovery. Without any local government base, it will be impossible to win back the 13 constituencies we lost in May 2010 as well as establishing a base of support to win in constituencies where we have traditionally been in third place.

Secondly the Party needs to clearly define the role of individual PPCs who are fighting in unwinnable seats to be given clear instructions on what is expected of them in terms of leading campaigns in the constituencies where they are standing as well as supporting neighbouring marginal constituencies. I felt it was important not only as a PPC to be leading on campaigns in Aldershot but also supporting my colleagues in the twinned marginal constituencies in Reading West and Reading East.

Thirdly I feel community organising needs to be fully integrated within the Labour Party and be a precondition for the selection of Labour Local Government and Parliamentary Candidates.

Fourthly CLPs need to receive more training from the centre where models of good practice which achieve a high turnout of activists is replicated and effective campaigns are carried out on a shoe string budget which myself and the local Labour councillors were able to do in Aldershot.

Finally the Labour Party need to be the focus of opposition to the Coalition cuts, speaking up for those in the South East and country as a whole who earn less than £40,000. We need to articulate an alternative vision of a new economy in the South East, created through an active industrial policy that encourages more high-paid, high-skilled, and more sustainable jobs.

I think our new leader Ed Miliband understands this which is why I supported him to be the Leader of the Labour Party. I am hopeful that whatever comes out of the Party review led by Peter Hain and the Policy review led by Liam Byrne will help Labour back on the road to recovery, winning again in those crucial areas of the South East and making us a Party of Government once more.

Jonathan Slater was Labour Parliamentary Candidate for Aldershot in 2010

Labour win first seat in Cornwall

The media are understandably and rightly focusing on last night's parliamentary by-election result in Oldham East & Saddleworth, where Labour's Debbie Abrahams retained the seat with a comfortable victory. However, Labour was also victorious in another by-election last night, in which victory was realised after Labour came from fifth place to win in a stunning result.

In a by-election to fill a vacancy on Cornwall Council, Labour’s Jude Robinson became the first and only Labour councillor on the 123 member authority. The swing from Conservative to Labour – close to 16% - propelled Jude from a fifth place in 2009 to the party’s newest elected local councillor.

Having watched this contest for some time, it is apparent that in Jude the party, and now the people of Camborne, have a hard working and dedicated advocate and campaigner. Her website is testimony to this.

The full result is available here on the Cornwall council website.

No time for a time out

May’s local elections should be Labour’s priority, argues Martin Phillips

Why did Labour lose the general election in 2010? This is the question that is still being argued over by commentators, politicians and party members. There are many different views, but there seems little agreement. There are even arguments about which particular groups deserted Labour.

But rather than extending that debate even further, I’d like to focus on how we can win the next general election – by looking at how we won in 1997. I also want to explain why all the talk of taking our time to decide our new policies is dangerous.

I’d like to mention three things that I think led to our 1997 victory. There are undoubtedly many more than three reasons, but I think these three things are things that we can control as a party.

First, 1997 was the culmination of a decade of electoral progress. That vast increase in Labour MPs mirrored a similar increase in local elections over the previous decade or more. Many of the seats we won in 1997 had Labour councils or at least had large numbers of Labour councillors. Why is this important? Because all that local election success had trained voters to vote Labour. Even if people were not ready to make that final step in Westminster elections, they were willing to try voting Labour in local elections. Local elections were a foot in the door. And it is also very noticeable that many of the parliamentary seats we lost in 2010 had seen Labour lose control of their councils (in many Labour were in third place).

Local elections (and Scottish, Welsh and London elections) are important ways to get people voting Labour again. That is why we need to stop thinking about the 2015 election as the target and start thinking about the May 2011 elections. Too many people are saying that Labour has to take time out to ponder its position. There isn’t time – the next election we will fight is in less than 4 months time. Labour needs to focus on these council elections, which leads me to my second point.

Labour won in 1997 because people knew what Labour stood for – there was a clear vision of what Labour would do. Apart from the key sound bites (“Education, education, education”, “Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime”), Labour stood for investment in better public services. Voters had heard for several years what Labour was going to do.

That is why I think that talk of extended policy reviews is self-indulgent and wrong-headed. As party staff keep telling us, elections are won over years, not the last six weeks. Between now and May, our council candidates need to have some answers when people ask, “Ok, so what would you do then?” We can’t have hugely detailed and fully costed plans, but we can have a vision of what we are for. We can show our direction of travel. What is the problems with saying that we think the country needs more council houses (we don’t need to say how many)? Why can’t we say that there needs to be tougher action to make bankers pay for the mess they created?

My final point is that we need to show that we understand the worries and insecurities that most people feel. In the run-up to the 1997 election, the economy was already recovering and people felt better off, so they wanted more and better public services. That is what Labour promised (and delivered, let’s not forget). But the run up to 2015 looks much less rosy – it is more likely to be held with mass unemployment, public services slashed and an atmosphere of deep insecurity or even fear and resentment. Labour needs to understand and express that mood.

We also need to have policies that address the concerns coming out of the big economic issues: the fear of unemployment, the erosion of pay and conditions, rising prices and the high costs of housing and energy. We need to give hope of a better future, not just a negative message about the evils of our opponents.

Winning again in the south (or more accurately in large towns and suburbs across the country), Labour Party members, the PLP and the shadow cabinet need to focus on three things:

• Building our councillor base again in seats we lost – get people voting Labour again
• We don’t have time to have long contemplation of our policies – people want answers now
• The policy vision we express must give hope and address the biggest issues people face – we need to give hope of better jobs with better pay, secure pensions and the care system, and some action to stop the massive increases in energy and housing costs.

We can’t hang about. We have 3 years of elections before the next general election. We have only three chances to persuade people to vote for us and get them used to voting for us, so that we can kick out this terrible Coalition. So let’s get our message sorted out quickly and start shouting it from the rooftops.

Martin Phillips is a member of Labour’s National Policy Forum, representing members from the South East.

Understanding the South

In many southern seats a Labour MP is a recent memory, not a pipedream explains Paul Richards

In conversation with a couple of old comrades in a Westminster pub last week, I was lobbied about the next meeting of my CLP by someone standing for the Conference Arrangements Committee (CAC), seeking the all-important Eastbourne nomination. I don’t know when the next meeting is, and neither does anyone else, because there isn’t one planned. No doubt we’ll get round to one in the Spring to choose some candidates for the council elections. That’s not to say the CLP is moribund. We’ve had some excellent meetings recently – to see Made in Dagenham at the local fleapit, the Christmas quiz at the Unite conference centre on the seafront, and the BBQ in my back garden last August. Our nominating meeting for the Labour leadership resulted in Ed Miliband in the fourth round of transfers. There are many new members, and a healthy, fraternal atmosphere.

It’s just that in towns such as Eastbourne, with no Labour representation at all, not even a parish councillor, the pace is less full-on, frenetic, factional. It was the same when I was the candidate in Lewes up the road back in 2001. The party in such areas is filled with decent, earnest people, often Londoners who’ve moved out, with backgrounds in trade unionism or public service. Come election time, a decent campaign can be mounted, with parliamentary hopefuls who put in the hours and expend the shoe-leather.

The kinds of fiercely-fought selection battles for council seats, or tightly-whipped votes on resolutions that characterise London CLP meetings (which I attended for 19 years) simply don’t exist in the same way. In Brighton, or Hastings, where we have representation and the possibility of winning seats, it’s a bit more organised. But across most of the South of England the Labour Party represents a harmless minority interest, like real ale, Morris Dancing or nudism.

The south fell out of love with Labour spectacularly in 2010. Gordon Brown was an alien being to most voters in Crawley, Hove, Dover or Gillingham. He spoke a foreign language. The animosity was mutual. There was no sense that he had any understanding or sympathy with southern England. I always felt that he blamed the south for voting Tory and condemning his own country to economic decline and exploitation. At times, it felt like he blamed the south for the Highland Clearances. No matter how many Asdas he visited in the campaign, there was no meeting of minds between the Enlightenment economist, and people in Sussex and Kent who had never been to Scotland, and would never have any cause to do so. For this vast section of the electorate, the closest they would come to Scottish culture was re-runs of Balamory.
With Ed, there is a better chance of reconnection. Ed sounds English; his vowels are rounded, and he can connect with the Waitrose-shopping English middle-classes. His choice of shadow chancellor shows that this need to connect outweighs the need for detailed economic knowledge. ‘Appearing human’ may seem like setting the bar quite low for Labour’s leadership. After the past three years, it’s the right place to start.

The task for local Labour parties is similar – to look and seem like a normal part of the community in southern towns and counties. That might mean simple things – such as making sure Labour activities are listed in local papers alongside the bowls club and WI, or having a presence at community events, county fairs and in the high streets and town squares. It might mean more labour-intensive activity, such as trying for a full slate of candidates in local elections, so no part of the south is a no-go area. The success of Duncan Enright winning a town council seat in Witney in Oxfordshire last week shows that it’s always worth having a go, and with the Lib Dems in meltdown, Labour candidates can pull surprises.

There are potential Labour supporters across the south of England, especially young people growing up against the backdrop of riots, cuts and shrinking opportunities. I grew up in south Bucks, for heaven’s sake – hardly the most likely of precursors to a lifetime in the Labour Party. Labour can win back the south, with a combination of credible leaders, policies which reflect southern concerns around jobs, business, crime and public services, and hard work on the ground. We have one massive advantage over previous generations – the knowledge that it’s possible. In Crawley, Hove, Brighton, Hastings, Dover, and Dartford and many more places, a Labour MP is a recent memory, not a distant pipedream. Where once Labour won, Labour can win again.

Paul Richards is the author of Labour’s Revival and a former special adviser to the Labour Government. He is vice-chair of Eastbourne CLP.

Third Place First - No "No Go" Areas for Labour

Those good people at Progress have thrown their weight behind a campaign called Third Place First, which shares similar objectives with this website. Their campaign is being launched at the House of Commons on 18th January (7-9pm). Speakers include Andy Burnham MP, Joan Ryan and Deborah Mattinson.

You can read more about the campaign here and to register interest in attending the event contact David Green at Progress (david@progressonline.org.uk)

A way back for Labour in the South

Ben Bradshaw MP explains how Labour can chart a course back into Government

The 2010 general election result was dreadful for Labour in the South of England outside London. We were reduced from 45 MPs to just 10: two in each of Bristol, Southampton and Luton, one in Plymouth, plus Exeter, Oxford East and Slough.

It could have been even worse. Labour only did fractionally better in terms of our share of the vote than in our worst ever result in 1983, when we only got 3 MPs in these regions. The reason we held on to 10 this time was a combination of exceptional organisation and campaigning in some of the seats we held and the less than overwhelming Conservative performance. But the mountain Labour has to climb in the south to win back the seats we lost this year and in 2005 is huge.

Joan Ryan, the former Labour MP who had a terrific result in Enfield North but still lost narrowly this year, has done an analysis of some of the seats we lost in 2005, which is all the more alarming. In many cases where the Tories scraped in in 2005 they are now sitting on five figure majorities. So, coming back from here for Labour is going to be very hard. It will require a fundamental look at the reasons for our decline in southern England outside London and policies to address it.

The veteran Labour politician Giles Radice and the former No 10 adviser Patrick Diamond have written an updated version of Giles’ seminal 1992 Fabian pamphlet on “southern discomfort.” It’s a useful start – along with the detailed analysis of voting behaviour in the election – for understand and addressing the problem. Labour did particularly badly in terms of the number of votes we lost among the skilled white working class and lower middle class suburban families.

These groups of voters are concentrated in higher proportions in seats in southern England outside London. We did relatively well among traditional/tribal working class Labour supporters and urban intellectuals. That helps explain our better than average results in places like Oxford and Exeter. Anyone who was out on the doorstep during the election knows what the issues were that hurt us.

Immigration (usually as a proxy for a shortage of housing and pressure on other services) and a feeling among those C1s and C2s and suburban families that we’d lost touch and weren’t on their side.

Perceived unfairness in the tax and benefits system was also a major grievance. How often did I hear voters talk not about mythical people whose cases they had read about in the tabloid press but friends of theirs or even members of their own family who were on benefits and apparently no worse off than they were although they were the ones getting up and doing a full day’s work every day?

In his original “Southern Discomfort” Giles Radice identified Labour’s then failure to appeal to the “aspirational” voters as our Achilles heel. Labour’s historic successes in 1997 and the two subsequent elections were partly because people felt Labour had finally “got” aspiration. Giles’s conclusion this time is that insecurity has replaced aspiration. That we failed to address the insecurity and sense of fairness of the hard working voter who did very well under Labour until 2006 but have seen their living standards at best stagnate since. Coupled with that, the global economic crisis, ensured that insecurity about their and their children’s future was their overriding concern at this election.

I suspect insecurity will be around for some time to come – not least given the impact of the coalition government’s disastrous economic policies on jobs. But we would be wrong to think aspiration has gone away. It is natural and desirable for people to want to get on and for their children to have more opportunity and better lives than they have. That’s what the Labour Party should be for. If the economy does recover and people begin to feel more optimistic about their futures we need to make sure we can appeal to them.

There is a danger that retrenched back into our heartland areas in the north and the big cities it is harder for southern voices to be heard. With only 10 MPs and one shadow cabinet member (John Denham) from the south, we have to be extra careful that the debate is not dominated by voices from areas that always have been and will for the foreseeable future be strongly Labour. That is why our members and small band of councillors in southern England are so important. It is vital that you get your voices heard. We also have a great opportunity to boost our councillor base in next May’s elections. The Lib Dem vote is evaporating in many parts of the South as progressive voters show their disgust at Nick Clegg’s support for Thatcherite policies. This means Labour should be able to pick up council seats across southern England including in local authority areas that have been Labour free zones. This will require hard work, discipline and relentless targeting, but it can be done.

The AV referendum is also a chance to rebuild in the South. Views will of course vary there as in other parts of the country, but support for AV is likely to be higher – particularly in those areas where Labour voters have long felt disenfranchised by the current first past the post system.

I’m optimistic that if we do all these things and pull together as a Party nationally and locally then we can come back – including in those seats in southern England Labour needs to win to form a Government.

Rt Hon Ben Bradshaw is Labour MP for Exeter

Welcome to Southern Front

Welcome to Southern Front. This website and blog is a home for debate and discussion about why Labour has lost the support of so many voters in Southern England (outside of London), and what is needed to win those voters back.

In 1997, Labour's landslide victory saw the election of 59 Labour MPs in constituencies in the South of England; at the 2010 general election just ten of those constituencies returned Labour MPs. In Southampton, home to two of Labour’s southern MPs, fewer than 3,000 additional Conservative votes in the city would have seen Alan Whitehead & John Denham join the ranks of Labour’s southern dispossessed. Across the South as a whole, Labour failed to win 187 of the region’s 197 seats, and has no MPs whatsoever in 19 English counties.

The situation is even bleaker when one considers the extent to which Labour’s decline in the South has been mirrored by its local government base. Labour controls just five southern councils; our 600 councillors represent less than one in ten of all those elected south of the Midlands. In Kent, England’s largest county and until 2010, the home of 8 Labour MPs, we have 94 of the county’s 724 councillors. The picture is no better in Surrey, where there are only 5 Labour councillors elected across the entire county. A similar picture exists elsewhere across the South. Indeed, Labour is entirely unrepresented on 71 councils in the political south, who combined provide local services to a population of nearly 8 million voters.

Consideration of this problem is not new. Following Labour’s 1992 general election defeat, the Fabian Society published Southern Discomfort, a pamphlet by Giles Radice, then the Labour MP for Durham. Radice’s pamphlet sought to explain why Labour had failed to make the breakthrough in southern marginal seats necessary for the election of a Labour government. Following the party’s defeat in May 2010, Radice revisited the problem when he co-authored with Patrick Diamond Southern Discomfort Again. The pamphlet sought to “address the crippling weakness that Labour faces in Southern England following the 2010 defeat”.

Commendable though Radice’s efforts have been, tackling Labour’s “crippling weakness” in the south requires more attention than a pamphlet every twenty years. Indeed, had Labour in Government paid more attention to the problems it was facing in the South, we might still be in Government. Two thirds of the seats we lost in May were in Southern and Midlands constituencies. 70% of the 940,000 votes Labour lost between 2005 and 2010 were in constituencies in the political south. This website will be a forum for Labour at all levels of our party to discuss and debate a path back to electoral success in the South. The party’s future success depends on it.

Stuart King, Southern Front