Winning in Ipswich

The initial euphoria of victory has worn off, and the hard work of running Ipswich has begun. Election expenses have been submitted and “Thank you” newsletters printed and now being delivered. In Ipswich we won 12 seats out of the 16 being contested (we have elections by thirds) including all five of our target seats. Sadly the results achieved here were not repeated throughout southern England. So what did we do in Ipswich and did we do it differently?

A little background: Labour lost control of Ipswich in 2004 after 25 years as a Labour borough; Last year we lost the Parliamentary seat by 2079 votes. On a more positive note we managed to regain some Borough Council seats even in 2008 and 2009. Ipswich Labour Party is also unusual in having a full-time Labour organiser. We also campaign hard all year round.

Target seats: We needed to hold on to the seven seats we were defending and gain two seats to take control of the Council – which sounded achievable. The first seat seemed easy – Westgate ward, which we have only lost once, in 2007, and have since built up a good majority. The second seat would be more difficult: Either Alexandra ward which we had not won since 2002 and Rushmere, won once since 2002, in 2008, with a local candidate who had stood on three separate occasions leading to him building a strong personal vote. We decided to give both equal priority. Believing our Labour-held seats to be safe, (even Whitehouse ward – majority of 2 last year) we added in Stoke Park and Whitton, the only other seats we have won on current ward boundaries.

The politics: Perhaps we are fortunate with our opponents. The Tories running Suffolk County Council grasped the opportunity to “divest” itself of all Council services, setting out plans to scrap school crossing patrols and closure (unless teams of volunteers could be found) of three Ipswich libraries. We latched on to these two services, and turned them into Borough election issues. The cash saved by scrapping them was peanuts; We campaigned strongly against these cuts – petitions at school gates, leaflets and the like over the winter and moved an amendment to the Borough Council budget to enable us to take over responsibility for both services, without any increase to council tax. The Tories and Liberals were foolish enough to vote down our proposal.

Now the hard work: Having spent Autumn and Winter, campaigning mainly through petitions and newsletters, from early February we took to the phones, hitting the 5% targets set by Head Office in their eight Ipswich target wards, which happily included our five targets. In March we stepped up this campaigning, with the Party Office open 4pm to 8pm every weekday and doorstep sessions every weekend. We concentrated our phone work on the four seats we considered our key targets: Alexandra, Rushmere, Stoke Park and Whitton hitting the 10% Head Office targets in each. We also delivered 50,000 newspapers across the Borough – the bulk of them free of charge as our reward for hitting February’s targets.

The Short Campaign: From 25th March we had daily doorstep campaign sessions, with “mass campaign” sessions from Friday through to Monday each week, where all campaigning would be focused on our target wards. In total we made over 22,000 voter id contacts across the borough, 60% of which were in our four key target wards. We gathered intelligence on opposition activity, and when it became clear they were putting no effort into Labour-held wards, it became easier to convince our own activists to move. Our leaflet delivery effort was supplemented by new members, new supporters and angry library users. By polling day, we knew that the Liberals wouldn’t be working much anywhere and that the Tories would be throwing everything at Rushmere ward. We ran a more balanced campaign, and having delivered “Vote on Thursday” leaflets in our “safe” wards; “Vote Todays” in only seven wards – the four priority wards plus St John’s (Tory councillor to beat there in 2012), Westgate and Whitehouse – we then concentrated our GOTV effort on the four target seats.

The result: We made five gains, two from the Liberals and three from the Tories – We won the seat of the former Lib Dem leader and the Mayor. We almost beat the Tory Council Leader in the non-target ward of Holywells, just 93 votes short. Labour now has 28 seats; Tories 16 and Lib Dems 4. And next year we have another four seats to be won in wards we won this year. We’re already back on the doorstep and we aim to keep on winning.

Conclusion: We got the politics right; We got the strategy right; We worked hard and we had good organisation. Having a professional Labour Organiser makes a big difference – it ensures activity happens, the leaflets are printed, provides organisational leadership and helps deliver results like this. I would say that, wouldn’t I, but so does the Labour Group and the Party membership.

John Cook is Election Agent for Ipswich Labour Party

Unity South West issue challenge to Labour Councillors

Unity South West has today written to every Labour councillor in the South West asking them to pledge to transform the Labour Party in their area to become a vehicle for community organising.

In our letter we argued that only by focusing on community issues, at localised branch level, can we build a mass membership party that allows local people to feel empowered to organise within it to action change; and that by doing so, we build trust with the electorate and win elections – not because we knocked on their house like a crazed encyclopedia salesman two months before an election but because we understand the community, its hopes and its concerns and we provide a vehicle through which to channel that energy.

Clearly we recognise at Unity South West that the focus needs to be on election campaigning at election time, and that party business can only be actioned by party members. But what we’re promoting is an extension of that administrative and electoral function, inviting non-party members to our meetings to discuss and identify key community issues from which we can organise campaigns and solutions. By doing so we will promote the broad church that the Labour Party has to be and gain trust from our communities that our values are the right values in difficult times.

Some people will no doubt disagree but we have a mountain to climb in the coming years, especially in the South West. The South West is the most rural dominated region in England and currently only has four Labour MPs and no Labour MEP yet we have the right values from which a vision for the South West can be drawn – defending public services, investing in public transport, providing a sensible housing policy, instilling economic growth to provide employment opportunities and ensuring educational quality – all of which provide some of the most complex and serious problems for people right across the region.

As an area with a high degree of ‘swing voters’ and a higher number of disenfranchised Liberal Democrat supporters we have a significant challenge to prepare our movement in readiness to take on a Conservative Party whose support is remaining solid or increasing; providing the progressive alternative in a region that either makes or breaks a Labour Government victory in 2015.

Unity South West will continue to get the right people around the table, identifying our shared values in the broad labour movement and agreeing to work together to bring a focus of community and a strategy of organising empowerment.

To find out more about the Unity South West campaign and how to get involved visit www.unitysouthwest.co.uk

Darren Jones was Labour's parliamentary candidate in Torridge & West Devon in 2010.

Refounding Labour events in the South

Regional Labour offices are organising a series of Refounding Labour and New Politics Fresh Ideas consultation events during May and June. It is important that as many southern members as possible attend these events.

Eastern

Saturday 21st May (10:30-13:30)
Kempston Centenary Hall, Kempston town council, Bedford Road, BEDFORD MK42 8BG

Thursday 26th May (19:30)
Ipswich library, Northgate Street, IPSWICH IP1 3DE

Friday 3rd June (19:30)
Bennetts End Community Centre, Gatecroft, Bennetts End HP3 9LX

Saturday 4th June (14:00)
1 Whitehall Estate, Flex Meadow, HARLOW CM19 5TP

Saturday 11th June (10:30-16:00)
Cambridge Professional Development Centre, Foster Road, CAMBRIDGE CB2 9NL

Thursday 16th June (19:30)
St Mark's Hall, Hall Road, NORWICH NR2 1NL

South East

Tuesday 24th May (19:00-21:00)
Edmund Kell Hall, Bellvue Road, SOUTHAMPTON SO15 2AY

Wednesday 1st June (18:30-21:00)
Cornwallis Suite, Horntye Park Sports Complex, Bohemia Road, HASTINGS TN34 1EX

Monday 6th June (19:00-21:00)
Netherfield Meeting Place, Farmborough, MILTON KEYNES MK6 4JB

Wednesday 15th June (18:30-21:00)
Conference Hall, RISC, 35-39 London Street, READING RG1 4PS

Wednesday 15th June (18:30-21:00)
Martin Grove Suite, Lordswood Leisure Centre, North Dane Way, CHATHAM ME5 8YE

Saturday 18th June (10:30-14:00)
Media Centre, Labour Party, 39 Victoria Street, LONDON SW1H 0HA

South West

Tuesday 24th May (19:00)
Unison House, The Crescent, TAUNTON TA1 4DU

Friday 27th May (19:00)
Whipton & Pinhoe Labour Club, Vaughan Road, EXETER EX1 3JT

Wednesday 1st June (19:00)
Bodmin Public Rooms, Shire House, Mount Folly, BODMIN PL31 2DQ

Wednesday 1st June (19:00)
Lansdown Hall & Gallery, STROUD GL5 1BN

Friday 3rd June (19:00)
Meadowcroft Community Rooms, Addison Crescent, Straton, SWINDON SN2 7JX

Friday 10th June (19:00)
Dorchester Town Hall, High Street East, DORCHESTER DT1 1HF

Saturday 18th June (10:30)
The Greenway Centre, Doncaster Road, BRISTOL BS10 5PY

Labour’s rose wilts in the garden of England

Labour’s success in Gravesham, where we won back control of the council direct from the Conservatives, should not be allowed to mask what were a poor set of results for the party in the Garden of England.

With barely thirty net gains in council seats and a failure to win back councils like Thanet and Dover, the People’s Party seems to be out of step with swing voters in the country’s largest county.

In 1997 Labour won all eight marginal seats in the county on its way to a record tally of Labour MPs in the county. After the 2010 general election all these seats were back in Conservative hands, but Labour must have hoped to have made some inroads in these constituencies in the first poll of voters since the coalition was formed. The results displayed in the table below, tell a worrying tale of the limited and little progress made in these first twelve months.



If the local election votes cast early this month were replicated at a general election, Labour would fail to win back a single one of the seats we lost in 2010.

Labour’s best performance came in Gravesham, where a 7.4% swing gave the party its best performance in the county. Whilst it was enough to regain control of the council, it would have been insufficient to regain the parliamentary seat: the Conservatives were still 5% ahead, despite the big swing back to Labour.

Creditable performances in Thanet South and Sittingbourne & Sheppey (and possibly Dover) are encouraging, but performance in the county's remaining seats was dismal. In Gillingham & Rainham we only just managed to secure the votes of one in four of those going to the polls. In Chatham & Aylesford there was actually a swing to the Conservatives.

So what went wrong? Bill Esterson, a former Medway councillor who was elected Labour MP for Sefton in 2010, sets out his thoughts in a recent article on Progress Online. He is certainly right about the lack of resources available to both CLPs and the regional party.

Dartford CLP hit the nail on the head when they highlight on their website that while the “Labour core vote held up, the Conservatives were able to motivate their support, and increased the turnout of their supporters”.

Labour councillors and activists are right to use an anti-cuts narrative in their local campaigning. Protecting local public services goes to the heart of why many people join and become active in Labour. But we need to appreciate that in order to break out of our core vote we must offer an alternative as well as opposition.

These local results suggest steady as she goes isn’t going to be enough. Here are five things Labour must do to become competitive again in Kent and right across the south:

1) Improve funding and support for the South East regional party – activists in the south value the support they receive from the regional party but it is stretched too thinly.

2) Labour’s best results in 2010 came where organisers were in place locally in advance of the election. Labour needs to find the resources and the right people to get key swing constituencies back on track.

3) Liam Byrne’s policy review needs to specifically address Labour’s southern discomfort issue. Policies tailored to the aspirational voters who are not part of Labour’s core need to be prioritised.

4) Ed Balls, John Healey and Baroness Royall should continue to be the shadow cabinet champions for the East of England, South east And South West respectively. Frontbenchers should be required to make a minimum number of visits to southern swing seats and to coordinate these visits with local parties and councillors.

5) We need candidates in place in all eight of these key seats in Kent (and indeed elsewhere in the south). At present only Chatham & Aylesford and Dover are due to select candidates early. Given most Kent voters wont go to the polls again until the 2013 county elections, the local leadership a candidate provides is essential if we are to continue campaigning all year round in these seats.

Winning again in Kent is integral to Labour winning again in the South. May’s local election results show that those winning ways have yet to return.

Stuart King is Editor of Labour Southern Front.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: the Labour movement in the South West still has much to do

The South West is always an interesting region for Labour Party politics and the recent local elections continue to provide food for thought.

There is no question that Labour had a good result across the region this week, with retained and additional councillors right across the South West.

Of the 36 Local Authorities in the South West region Labour Councillors can now be found in 19 of them, giving us 52.7% regional coverage, and including some 202 hard working councillors and activists.

The biggest gains were made in the Forest of Dean (+9), South Gloucestershire (+6) and Plymouth (+5) with Bristol (+4), Exeter (+4) and Stroud (+4) not far behind.

Five of these gain areas (Plymouth, Bristol, Exeter, Stroud and the Forest of Dean) have also been previously Labour controlled councils, instilling some hope that in the years to come they may be so once again.

There were also some nice surprises.

Whilst we made expected yet hard fought gains in areas such as Bristol, Exeter and Plymouth we also achieved some surprising results in dark blue areas such as Torridge, Torbay and the South Hams. Having stood as the PPC in Torridge & West Devon at the last general election I can tell you that getting a Labour councillor into the district council is quite the miracle!

However, it isn’t all good news.

We still only have four Labour MPs (Plymouth Moorview, Exeter, Bristol South & Bristol East) and no Labour MEP in the South West and whilst we’ve made impressive gains in the local elections not one of the local authorities is Labour controlled. There is still much more to do.

I would also argue that the foundations of the Labour movement in the South West – and perhaps in other regions too – contain an ugly truth; a truth that shows low membership, low recognition and low engagement.

It is often said that campaigners outside of the key cities in the South West are ignored, which I truly hope isn’t the case but, if it is, we must start in earnest to ensure a connected and efficient movement in the region.

As I have previously said, the Tory vote in the South West is either staying strong or increasing. Whilst the Liberal Democrats are an easy target the focus must be on Conservative politicians throughout the region; after all the Tories want the Liberal Democrats to take the kicking so that they can pass on by and stay in Government.

In order for us to win back the key seats we lost in 2010 in 2015 – and in doing so take our party back into Government – as well as electing a South West Labour MEP again in 2014 we must not only protect our key areas of core support but share our experiences, our skills and our support for those activists in the wider region.

Whilst winning elections is hard work we can sometimes forget why we’re in politics at all. It shouldn’t just be about winning elections, it should be about providing a vehicle through which the community feels able to meet, communicate and solve community problems together. It should be about empowerment and delivering change.

We have much work to do in building grassroots relationships with our past, our present and our future. Many trade unionists are no longer party members, many active community campaigners don’t see party politics as the best way of achieving change and a significant proportion of young people are no longer joining parties, co-ops or trade unions at all.

We have much to offer, but we have much to do. Lets work to rebuild our networks, to reach out to support our regional comrades in distant wards and to work towards empowering our communities and, as part of that process, get Labour back into power in the years yet to come.

Darren Jones was Labour's parliamentary candidate in Torridge & West Devon in 2010. He blogs at http://www.theadvocatesocialist.wordpress.com/

How well did Labour perform in the south?

There is much for Labour to be pleased about following Thursday’s English local elections. The election of 800 additional Labour councillors puts Labour’s tally of local elected representatives comfortably over the 2,000 mark – a sign of national respectability and credibility. It was also great to see Labour winning in places where we have struggled in the past. Congratulations to the new Labour councillors for Bideford (Torridge DC) and Dartmouth (South Hams) in Devon, and to our new Labour Group in Rother, East Sussex.

While nationally Labour now controls an extra 26 local authorities, here in the south Labour was only able to contribute Gravesham and Ipswich to that tally. Ed Miliband was right to visit Gravesham to celebrate Labour’s victory there, and in so doing highlight that Labour’s southern recovery was underway. But he could - and should - have had many other town halls to visit on a champagne cork-popping southern victory tour.

A really good set of southern results would have included victory in Norwich (where we managed only 2 of the 4 gains required to take control); Reading (3 of 5); Exeter (4 of 6); Dover (4 of 8); and Thanet (6 of 8). In Crawley, where we could have seized control with 7 extra seats, we failed to register a single gain.

As Atul Hatwal says on Labour Uncut “revival in local government is an essential pre-requisite for national success”. So how did Labour perform in the 100 marginal wards we identified in key parliamentary seats we lost last year? In short, a mixed bag; some very good performances in places like Ipswich and Waveney were contrasted with some distinctively average and in some places downright poor results (Crawley).



Labour won outright in 33 of the 100 wards, with the Tory share falling from 63 to 38*. Over half of these gains were at the hands of the Conservatives, (17) a sign that Labour is beginning to be competitive against our principal rival in the region. But more detailed analysis shows that 16 of these gains from the Conservatives were in seats in either the South West or East of England. Labour failed to make any gains in the target seats in Crawley, Dartford, Chatham & Aylesford, Portsmouth North or Reading West. Of our 100 seats to watch, only in Brighton, Hove, Thanet South and Sittingbourne & Sheppey did we make gains. Does Labour have a south eastern problem?

Stuart King is Editor of Southern Front.

* does not include results from Dover, which are not yet available online.

The 100 results to watch

Of the thirty five parliamentary seats Labour lost in the south and east last year, all but Hastings has council elections this week. These elections represent not only an early opportunity to pass judgement on the performance of the Coalition, but also a chance for Labour to assess the strength of its recovery in these key southern swing constituencies, as it seeks to bounce back from last year’s electoral rout.

We have looked earlier at Labour’s prospects of winning back control of town halls across the south; but in many senses the crucial battles lie in 100 council seats being contested in parliamentary constituencies Labour must win back if it is to form the next Government.



The overwhelming majority of these seats were won by the Conservative when they were last contested in 2007. Whilst progressives feel betrayed by the Liberal Democrats, our efforts and focus must be directed against the dominant partner in the coalition, the Conservatives. In only 14 of these seats are the Liberal Democrats our target. In three quarters of these seats it is a straight Red-Blue contest.

The increase in Labour candidates contesting this week’s elections is testimony to the determination of the party to bounce back from the disappointment of last May. But an enthused and motivated political party doesn’t necessarily make for a winning party. On Friday morning the results in these 100 seats will go some way to telling us whether Labour has taken the first steps on its road back to Government.

Stuart King is Editor of Southern Front.