posted:
21/11/2008 16:25:10
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There were two principal council elections held on the 20th November. The Lib Dems gained one seat from the Tories and Labour held one seat. There was one Parish Council result reported to ALDC which the Lib Dems held.
There is a tradition of service in the Walmsleys. Service to the community but also service to the Liberal Democrats. Frances Amrani is the daughter of Chris Walmlsey of the South Derbyshire by-election fame. Frances has been standing in council elections since her student days in Manchester in the 1980’s, perhaps 8 or 9 times without success. But persistence has finally paid off. She was the victor in the Teversham Ward By-election for South Cambridgeshire Council.
Superficially her result may not look as good as it actually is. Both the other candidates have been county councillors for the Electoral Division which includes Teversham. The Independent was a Labour County Councillor and got Labour help in the by-election. He also was the chairman of the “South Cambs Against (stock) Transfer” and ran his campaign almost solely on that issue. He was not some typical centre-right Independent who split the Tory vote, but attacked us from the left and, in some sense, split the anti-Tory vote.
25% of all the votes cast in this by-election were postal votes and this part of the campaign was key to our success. We wrote to all non-Tory electors early in the campaign to encourage them to apply for a postal vote. This worked well. We then wrote to them twice before the postal vote ballot issue on top of the normal election literature and did a targeted good morning on the day the postal ballot arrived on doormats. On polling day we then reminded postal voters with a separate knock up leaflet that it was not too late to use their vote.
As a member of ALDC Frances has had her own mycouncillor website www.francesamrani.mycouncillor.org.uk for some 
time before the by-election was called. As with most things we do it’s hard to measure or isolate their electoral effect but it certainly did not do any harm! Remember ALDC is there to help get campaigners elected so you do not need to be a councillor to use the mycouncillor website hosting service.
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posted:
20/11/2008 10:54:42
The latest edition of ALDC's members’ newsletter "Campaigner" is now available. ALDC members can log in to the website and download this, and all previous editions.
The current edition highlights Nick Clegg's "Million Door Challenge", features campaigning and best practice ideas from Northampton, Hampstead and campaigners up and down the country fighting to save post offices. Comment this edition is from ALDC Chair Cllr Kath Pinnock and Welsh Assembly member Peter Black AM.
Campaigner is sent free to all ALDC members. ALDC membership is open to all members of the Liberal Democrats, £75 for gold membership, £45 for silver membership. Council Groups who join together receive a 12% discount. Click here for more information.
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posted:
17/11/2008 13:31:22
In the four principal council elections held on the 13th November the Lib Dems held one seat and the Tories held two. The BNP gained one seat from Independents. There were two parish council elections reported to ALDC, both were Tory holds.
In the Fenside Ward of Boston Borough Council in Lincolnshire we had a perfect storm for the BNP that many local residents who did not vote will probably live to regret. Until 2007 the ward had elected Labour councillors when the local pressure group campaigning for a by-pass for the town stood a slate of candidates winning 27 of the 32 councils seats. Since then the wave of local euphoria has ebbed with no progress on the bypass other than rumours of a back room deal. A succession of defections and disqualifications has reduced the “BBI”’s numbers to 18. So an area let down by the established parties, with little Lib Dem presence opts for change and gets let down again. Add to this mix one of the largest local employers, Geest, sold its many local food processing businesses in 2005. Until now this has not been an issue but the purchaser was Bakkavor, an Icelandic firm and many are now concerned for their jobs With large Portuguese and East European communities the BNP has had fertile ground. Our small local team stood a candidate and delivered an A3 and an A4 but on a poor turnout the disillusioned electorate has voted in a racist. The BNP stand in about 25% of local council elections. If one is called in your area assume the BNP are going to stand and prepare accordingly. ALDC has updated and re-published “Tackling the BNP” available online on our website www.aldc.org. to help you combat the threat of the far right.
In the Markfield Stanton and Field Head ward of Hinckley and Bosworth Council in Leicestershire we were fighting the squeeze in a Labour/Tory marginal. The Tories stooped to new lows exploiting and distorting issues around travellers yet we still managed to hold back the BNP and increase our vote by 12.8 % at Labour's expense.
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