Our Euroelection campaign
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At its April meeting the EC agreed that preparations should be made to contest the elections to the European Parliament, should they take place as planned on 23 May, in the same two regions, the South East and Wales, as in 2014.
South Wales branch decided not to go ahead despite the temptation of a Party Political Broadcast there as last time, on the grounds of too short notice and too risky. There is indeed a risk that the elections may not actually take place as it is the government’s intention to cancel them if parliament votes for a deal before 23 May, which could mean, depending on at what point they were called off, that the work and money spent on preparing leaflets for free postal distribution would be wasted. If the elections are called off we will get our deposit of £5000 back but not any money spent on leaflets.
Despite this, Kent and Sussex Branch and the Election Committee decided to go ahead with contesting the South East Region. This comprises not just Kent and Sussex but also Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Hampshire, Surrey and (mistakenly omitted from the notice in next month’s Socialist Standard) Berkshire; in other words such major cities as Southampton, Brighton, Oxford and Reading.
The closing date for handing in nomination papers is 4 p.m tomorrow. Ours were handed in, and accepted today. The election is a Party List system in which seats are allocated to parties in proportion to the number of votes cast for their list. There are 10 MEPs for the South East. Here is our list of names as they will appear on the ballot paper (in alphabetical order as names is essentially what they are, no celebrities or defectors from other parties)
Mandy Bruce, Ray Carr, Dave Chesham, Rob Cox, Mike Foster. Stephen Harper, Neil Kirk Anton Pruden, Andy Thomas, Darren Williams.
All but two come from the region and so will be able to vote for themselves for a change.
The full Party name and one of our registered descriptions “World Socialist Movement” will appear on the ballot paper together, unlike last time, with our emblem.
The campaign will be organised in the east of the region by Kent and Sussex Branch and in the west by West London, South West Regional, and West Midlands branches. Street stalls are being planned in various places.
It will be up to Conference and the May EC to decide if we take the risk of preparing tens of thousands of leaflets for free postal distribution in various areas and, if so, how many and which (we couldn’t cover them all as there are some 6.5 million electors). The alternative would be to print a much smaller number and distribute them ourselves or by other means such as commercial distribution. This would mean that they could be more general (those for free postal distribution have to show clearly at the top for what election on what date and for which region they are for) and could be used even if the election is called off.
At the last elections in 2014 the Party list got 5,454 votes.
Would it be possible to include on the election leaflet details of the 3 month free trial offer of the Socialist Standard? Might as well get some publicity in.
Can the election leaflet text and lay-out be written in a manner that it can be recycled?
The relevant dates and details capable of being chopped off by the guillotine we have in HO. So that the money isn’t entirely wasted if no election occurs
Arra best
Actually Alan that’s not a bad idea. We’d just have to ensure that what was on the back could be chopped too without affecting the rest. Having said that, last time we negotiated with Royal Mail not have to do a separate leaflet for each constituency but to put all the ones we had chosen at the top of the same leaflet. As we chose 20 constituencies this took up 6 lines instead of just 2. Still, it could be done. Mind you, we had nearly a quarter of million leaflets printed and distributed last time. It would take us years to distribute that number by hand. But I don’t think that, if we go down this route, we’d have that many done this time.
Robbo, I’m afraid your specific proposal of putting on the free trial sub to the Standard wouldn’t work on the free postal distribution one. Royal Mail lays down that there must be no advertising and that the content must relate to the election, but last time they did allow us to say:
“For further details of our policy and a free information pack write to: The Socialist Party FREEPOST. Email: spgb @ worldsocialism.org. Phone: 020 7622 3811. Or visit our website: http://www.worldsocialism.org”
Which is good enough. In the past they have asked us to insert the words “in this election” after “our policy”, but they didn’t, so a precedent has been set.
Hello,
“and West Midlands branches”
As a new member living in Birmingham I have just joined this branch, how would I be able to help? As would love to get involved.
What areas come under the West of the South East Region?
James
Here are the runners and riders. There are 9 lists. The 8 lists we are standing against are the usual suspects plus the Brexit (including the man himself) and Change (whose top candidate is the outgoing Tory MEP) parties and a mysterious UK European Union Party:
James, the nearest part of the South East electoral region to you is Banbury, 40 miles down the M40. A further 28 miles brings you to Oxford. We have members and sympathisers in both places. The idea would be for West Midlands branch to cover these places (leafletting, street stalls). Details haven’t yet been finalised but will be this weekend.
We do know for certain that we will have a stall in Burford on Saturday 11 May for the Leveller’s event (details here). We can do some leafletting there too, even if this is Tory heartland or maybe in neighbouring Chipping Norton which has some Labour councillors despite being where Cameron lives (it used to have a textile mill and has a history of trade union militancy).
Is it too much to hope that the text for the election manifesto will be a bit spikey for a change? If nothing else, just to have a change of tone. See if it catches people’s attention more.
To use an old pop music analogy – which I’m sure I’ve used before – less Beach Boys ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice‘ and more MC5’s ‘Kick Out The Jams‘.
More on the UK EU Party here. Die-hard Remainers.
More here, including about their candidate in the South East region, Pacelli Ndikumana. He seems well-meaning enough.
“Is it too much to hope that the text for the election manifesto will be a bit spikey for a change? If nothing else, just to have a change of tone. See if it catches people’s attention more.”
Not the manifesto but a flyer to be used in the meantime. Ample supplies will be available at Conference.
By the way, there are also 3 independent candidates standing in the South East region.
On the national scale, we are the only party even claiming to be socialist that is presenting a list. The only other vaguely radical parties standing, both in London, are the Animal Welfare Party and the Woman’s Equality Party.
Yeah, a bit of anger wouldn’t go amiss. I’m a bit sick and tired of the reasonableness of the election material, appealing to the ‘niceness’ of people. A bit too Kumbaya for my liking. A lot of people are angry right now, and they’ve every right to be so.
The opening shots of our campaign were fired on Saturday with the distribution of our “We’re Standing Here” at this International Workers’ Day event in Oxford.
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