Analysis -- Merton & Wandsworth

A little examination of the breakdown by ward (available here). Some breakdowns are very interesting. We got 578 votes in Merton, as opposed to 765 in Wandsworth (averages of 28 and 36, respectively). Postal votes complicate the picture a little, as they aren't grouped by ward, and we got 66 in Merton and 159 in Wandsworth. Our highest vote in Merton was 38 in Merton Park and St. Helier wards. In Wandsworth it was 54 in Latchmere (1.8% of votes cast) -- this appears to be one of the few Labour wards in Wandsworth. Of the Merton wards, St. Helier is Labour, while Merton Park is Independent. Both are down in Morden, so we have votes at the end of the Northern Line.

In some ways these figures confound my expectations, I thought we'd do better in Labour held Merton (which also returns Labour MP's), as compared to squarely Tory Wandsworth. Then again, Battersea Parliamentary constituency used to be Labour, and that's the area we leafletted. Further, Latchmere appears to have been squarely in the area we leafletted, so maybe that sort of thing pays off (it might also account for the higher postal vote).

The main thing it emphasises, that although in aggregate it sounds an impressive number, by ward it is our usual fare at council elections. The trick will be to tap into this latent vote and turn it into something bigger.

Just by way of comparison, TUSC averaged 15 votes per ward (308 in total) in Merton on the list election, and 28 (596) on the list election, which is pretty consistently behind us. The question to ask, is where a lot of our voters as confused as the BBC? If, however, you take our vote and replicate it across all 627 wards in London, it means we would achieve about 18,000 votes, which is close to the TUSC vote anyway.

Update: A more statistically minded comrade has pointed me in the direction of our average percentage. By that measure we did do better in Merton (average 1.1% of the vote) than in Wandsworth (0.9%). It's also been suggested we did well in St. Mary's Park ward (Wandsworth) thanks to the work of a mysterious comrade there. By percentage, then, our best overall result was St. Hellier (Merton), with 1.76%.

Merton & Wandsworth result

Thanks, Anomymous, you beat me to it. I was there when the result was proclaimed and have just got back.
Here it is:

Richard Tracey (Conservative) 65,197 43.1%
Leonie Cooper (Labour) 55,216 36.5%
Lisa Smart (Liberal Democrat) 11,904 7.9%
Roy Vickery (Green Party) 11,307 7.5%
Mazhar Manzoor (UKIP) 3,717 2.5%
Thamilini Kulendran (IND) 2,424 1.6%
James Martin (Socialist Party) 1,343 0.9%

Total Ballot papers 153,785
Invalid or Blank 2,677
Valid 151,108
Turnout: 40.2%

For the record, when reading out the result the Returning Officer did refer to our candidate simply as "The Socialist Party".

Nothing else to report except that I did see a write-in vote in South West for the ISLP or "Independent Socialist Labour Party", a one-family breakaway from the Scargill Labour Party (I know who he must be: he stood for Kingston council last May). Also the Independent candidate told me that at the last council elections he had stood for the LibDems in Tooting.

One day to go...

By this time tomorrow I will have voted. Voted for socialism, in fact. Since where I live there is no socialist candidate standing, I shall be taking part in the Socialist Party's write in vote, and writing "World Socialism" Across my ballot paper.

Lucky souls in Mertin & Wandsworth and Lambeth & Southwark constituencies can at least for for the socialist candidates there; but, to be clear, if you do, you are the one making the promise. The promise to campaign for, to build for, to work towards attaining common and democratic ownership of the means of producing and distributing wealth. If you're not capable of making that promise, we really don't want your vote.

Since we're not standing a list or a mayoral candidate, if you're in those constituencies, you'll need to carry out a write in vote on two of your three ballot papers.

Of course, there are elections and referendums going on across the UK, and we hope socialist readers will write in their vote for socialism. The more of us rejecting the choice of the factions of the capitalist party, the better.

Let's take a risk, anyone out there reading this, if you intend to vote socialist, either directly or by write in, let us know in the comments box. The more the better.

The man in the blue turban

Yesterday was the last Saturday before the election. Unfortunately it rained all day so we didn't do our stall in Clapham High Street and our election meeting there had below average attendance (though there was still an interesting discussion). Some leaflets were distributed in nearby Larkhill ward (the ward we did best in last time).

We had received an invitation to a hustings at exactly the same time organised by the "British Organisation of People of Indian Sub-continental Origin" (BOPIO) in Tooting. Unfortunately Bill, our candidate for the area (Tooting is in Wandsworth) couldn't attend as he was out of London, but the organisers allowed us to be represented by his election agent. So I went. On my way I saw an SWP poster saying "Boot Out Tory Boris" and "Vote Ken Livingston for Mayor. Vote Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) Against Cuts for the Assembly." I took a photo of it for the record as another example of the SWP's policy of campaigning to vote Labour.

The meeting was introduced by BOPIO President, Sinna Mani. He told me before the meeting that he thought at first we were Militant but then realised who we were. He said he knew somebody whose father had been in the party. It turned out to be Baroness Joan Lestor. I told him that she'd been in the party too before defecting to Labour.

All the parties who sent speakers (Labour, Tory, Liberal, Green) sent someone "of Indian sub-continental origin" (however remote), the Tory (somebody from their list) wearing a magnificant blue turban but he sounded like any Young Tory. Also present was Siobhan Benita, the Independent candidate for Mayor and darling of the chattering classes. She revealed that her mother had also come from the Indian subcontinent. She came out with nonsense about things being better if they were run by an "independent" rather than representatives of a political party, as if that would make any difference to the way capitalism works.

Also present was a one-person list for the GLA, Rathy Alagaratnam, who also came out with the "independents" would be better nonsense. Surprisingly, the independent candidate for Merton & Wandsworth, Thamilini Kulendran, did not turn up.

Afterwards we were all photographed for the BOPIO website. The organiser said she would circulate their members with the views of the parties and candidates who had turned up. So our views should reach a wider audience than the 25 or so who were present.

A tale of two meetings

Well, last night we had a bit of fun, lefletting Wimbledon. Always nice to meet a new set of letter boxes.

We then went on to leaflet a hustings in Wimbledon. We hadn't been invited onto the platform. A nice posh lady explained they wanted to talk about "substantive issues" and there would have been too many on the platform if they'd invited everyone. Considering I've been to hustings with 11 candidates on the platform that covered substantive issues quite well, I don't think that's a partcularly good reason to restrict the range of debate. Of course, they are entitled to do this (so long as the cost of the meeting is shared between the candidates so promoted) but our old friend the difference between what one can/may do and what one should do raises its head. Anyway, we were cordially recieved, except by one Tory who came back out to return our leaflet, scrumpled up into a ball. That was us told, I'm sure. Pillock.

Our next meetings was in Colliers Wood, where we caught the end of a TUSC meetings. About 20 people present, almost all committed members of one sect or other. They have tried to form the loosest allianc possible, but still cannot agree even within that. I'm always amazed by this, I know we get called dreadful sectarians, but really what we are trying to do is organise around a bare minimum: 1) political action 2) a campaign directly for common ownership. TUSC cannot even unite around that much, the SWP spakers calling for an endless round of struggles to stop the thing and save the pittance. Their refrain was trade union bureaucrat treahcery; but my experince in my union is that there simply isn't a stomach for a fight among the rank and file, mass unemployment has got us in a death grip. That's why political actionis so important. As we always say, if we can't expect people to vote for socialism we can't expect them to strike for it; and even the unemplyed can vote.

Kudos is due, though, for organising th meeting, in what has been a dismal election campaign largely devoid of debate. Thanks to the comrades who came out last night.

Make Wandsworth be Bradford?

Here's the details of the hustings on Saturday 28 April from 4pm to 7pm in Tooting:

NAPS Samaj Hall, 26B Tooting High Street, London SW17 0RG (next to NatWest Bank)

The meeting has been organised by the British Organisation of People of Indian Sub-continental Origin (BOPIO) and is aimed mainly, but not exclusively, at people with connections with this part of the world.

Unfortunately our candidate for Merton & Wandsworth is not available and it also coincides with our own election meeting at 52 Clapham High Street, SW4 7UN at exactly the same time. The organisers have, however, agreed to accept him to be represented by someone else. So we will be there. Unfortunately too, the only Indian language that we have leaflets in is Bengali (Bangla) while most of those present are likely to come from South India and Northern Sri Lanka. But we'll take some along anyway in case there's anyone from Bangladesh or West Bengal there.

They have also invited the candidates for Mayor but it's doubtful that Ken or Boris will turn up, but who knows?

At the hustings last week in Putney we met the Independent candidate for Merton & Wandsworth, Thamilini Kulendran and he gave us a copy of his election address. His slogan is "MAKE MERTON AND WANDSWORTH BE ANOTHER BRADFORD !" Turning Merton and Wandsworth into a decaying ex-industrial mill town doesn't seem a vote-winner on the face of it, but he wants to emulate George Galloway, emphasing that he too is against the War in Afghanistan. His address says:

"Electing Kulendran wasn't about choosing the next government, but sending a powerful message to the government and main opposition parties. They have to stop supporting illegal, bloody, costly foreign wars and leaving the vulnerable British citizens who served for this country to starve. The public don't believe that they have atoned for their role in the invasion and illegal occupation of other people's countries. Downing Street should not drown of those countries in blood!
Please consider this and act to save this country!
Will you be able to give a green signal to Kulendran?
Thamilini Kulendran hails from Sri Lanka and a Tamil. He is totally against the war in other countries. If you feel you are also against the war, please support him."

As we are more interested in debating this sort of issue than cycle lanes and lollipop ladies we invited him to debate the way to get rid of war at our election meeting. But he's more likely to be at the Tooting meeting. Which will give us a chance to discuss the matter there.

What will happen in Wimbledon tomorrow?

The organisers of the "hustings" tomorrow night in Wimbledon have refused to invite us and two other candidates in Merton & Wandsworth to speak from the platform.

Here is the email we sent them:

I see from the announcement below that you are organising a hustings this coming Tuesday. We are also contesting the Merton & Wandsworth GLA constituency and, as it is a principle of democracy that all candidates standing in an election should have an equal chance to put their views to electors, we are assuming that you have no objection to our candidate also being on the platform at the hustings. Looking forward to your confirmation.

And here is the reply we got:

We have only invited candidates from the four largest parties (Conservative, Labour LibDem and Green) to speak at this event.
The organisers thought long and hard about who to invite, and felt in the end that it would be impractical to invite all the constituency candidates, let alone candidates from all the parties standing for the Assembly. We are keen to have some real discussion of the issues that the London Assembly, and decided that it would be impractical to invite more than 4 candidates. As a result, of course, the parties attending will have to count a share of the cost of the hustings towards their election expenses.
So I'm afraid that James Martin is not invited to speak from the platform on this occasion. Of course he will be welcome to attend the hustings and to bring literature. There will also be opportunities for informal discussion before and after the formal proceedings, from 7.30 on.
Yours sincerely,
Linda Murgatroyd
for Transition Towns Wimbledon and Tooting, Wimbledon Civic Forum and St Mark's Church, Wimbledon,

This is not going to stop us going to the meeting and insisting on being allowed to speak from the platform as hustings are supposed to be occasions when all the nominated candidates have a chance to present their views to the electorate.

Full report on Wednesday morning on what we did and what happened.

The Putney Debate

Last night, our Wandsworth & Merton hustings in St. Mary's church Putney, scene of the historic Putney debates during the English revolution.

It was a fairly standard affair, the candidates were nice and chatty to each other before hand, and the chairing was a bit disorganised (people these days are generally out of the practise). A bit too much time/deference was given to the incubent Tory and his Labour challenger, perhaps partly explained by the fact that, as usual, most of the audience were partisans who lobbed brickbats at each of those sides.

We'd been informed that the debate was being filmed by documentary makers doing a series on the history of England. We decided I should cunningly use the quote from Colonel Rich previously mentioned here, to perhaps maximise our chances of getting onto the screen later (plus it is such a good line).

Of course, l'espirit d'escalier dominated the evening, I should have kicked comments about people keeping warm by wearing jumpers rather than turning the heating into touch. The risk for the elderly of getting respiratory illness remains if the air is cold. Every year tens of thousands of excess winter deaths can be accounted to the cold.

Elsewhere, it was hard to crow bar our case in to some of the debates. On cycling I noted that if we could feed clothe and house every man woman and child on Earth for two days work a week each (which we can) then our roads could be much less busy, and we could spread out a bit and make our communities the focus of our lives rather than living for business. Bit of a stretch, but at least I got to make the point. I also noted that our roads are socialist, we own them in common and have free access.

On the other candidates, Thamilini Kulendran turned up: his case seemed to be that he is independent (and he's a bit anti-war). I suspect, looking at his leaflet, his main purpose is to promote the Tamil case. Either that, or he had a thousand pounds going spare he fancied wasting. The UKIP candidate was hopeless, and he stuck to his talking point that UKIP are third in the polls. "Vote for me, I'm third". The Green was a real puritan (he was the one who brought up wearing jumpers instead of heating, with which the Tory agreed).

Our opponents

The full confirmed lists are out: Lambeth and Southwark

BARTLEY Jonathan Charles - Green Party

BLACKIE Rob - London Liberal Democrats

FLUSS James Gordon - Fresh Choice for London

LAMBERT Daniel Peter - The Socialist Party (GB)

MITCHELL Michael - The Conservative Party Candidate

SHAWCROSS Val - Labour Party Candidate

Merton and Wandsworth

COOPER Leonie - Labour Party Candidate

KULENDRAN Thamilini - Independent

MANZOOR Mazhar - Fresh Choice for London

MARTIN James William - The Socialist Party (GB)

SMART Lisa - London Liberal Democrats

TRACEY Richard Patrick - The Conservative Party Candidate

VICKERY Roy - Green Party

Apparently "Fresh Choice for London" is the UKIP tag line, though, given there is a UKIP list, I wonder if they are trying to maximise their chances by standing as two "parties" (i.e. if they win any constituency seats as Fresh Choice it won't count against the total for UKIP on the list). Either that, or they are just trying to tart up their image.

Southfields by-election result

The result of yesterday's by-election in this ward of Wandsworth Council was announced last night and can be found here.

On a much reduced poll the LibDem share was reduced from 18% to 6% and the Greens' from 8% to 3% with Labour's increasing from 23% to 40% compared to the 2010 borough elections. Don't know if this will be repeated in the London elections. Not that voters switching between reformist parties makes all that difference.

There's a council by-election in Merton on 3 May. By coincidence it's in a ward (Wimbledon Park) bordering on Southfields. We will be distributing the same "Vote for them? You must be joking!" leaflet as we did in Southfields.

Nomination papers handed in

The nominations papers and deposit for our candidate for Merton & Wandsworth (James Martin) were handed in and accepted today at 4 o'clock. I wasn't mugged as I walked from Wandsworth Town station to Wandsworth Town Hall with £1000 in £20 notes in my pocket. It appears that apart from the usual suspects (Tory, Labour, Liberal, Green, UKIP) there'll be an Independent as well as us, making 7 in all.

Tomorrow we go to Lambeth Town Hall to hand in the papers for our candidate there (Daniel Lambert). I won't reveal in advance the time or the route I'll be taking from my car to the Town Hall.

Progress report

The nomination papers for Lambeth & Southwark have all been signed. Those for Merton and Wandsworth will be signed tomorrow. The intention is to hand them in to the Returning Officers as soon as possible after the date for this opens on Tuesday 20 March.

The election manifestos are at the printers and will be delivered to us (20,000 of them) on Friday or Monday. Meanwhile we are distributing other leaflets, mainly in outlying parts of the constituencies which we are not planning to cover with the main leaflet. Today was Raynes Park, which is part of Merton.

Leafletted the Raynes Park Conservative Club and found a LibDem leaflet which revealed the name of our LibDem opponent -- Lisa Smart. A householder handed one of our leaflets back saying he didn't want "junk mail". I said it wasn't junk mail but an election leaflet but he insisted.

The ironic thing is that if you go to stopjunkmail.org.uk, which some householders give on their letter boxes and which campaigns to limit and ideally ban junk mail such as pizza menus, you find a petition to sign. It calls for a change in the Data Protection Act. This of course is a political demand which could only be achieved by political action and so by candidates standing for election and distributing their programme including door-to-door. So you'd think that people who want to ban junk mail wouldn't mind political leaflets.

South London branch will be handing out the manifestos and running a literature stall outside 52 Clapham High Street on Saturdays 14, 21 and 28 of April from about 11 am.

More voters than in Luxemburg and Malta

Just got back from a meeting of election agents at Wandsworth Town Hall. The only others present were the Green Party candidate Roy Vicary and a Labour Party agent. Apart from administrative details, we were informed that the electorate of the Merton & Wandsworth GLA constituency is 376,653, which is bigger than the electorate in the EU States Luxemburg and Malta. Unfortunately we won't be able to leaflet all these but our name will be on the ballot paper for those who go to vote.

On my way to the meeting I saw my first election poster. A joint one for Ken Livingstone for Mayor and Leonie Cooper for Merton & Wandsworth. I made sure that the occupants of the house know we're standing too. So now we know the name of our Labour opponent. Just checked. She's a Labour councillor who stood at the last GLA elections four years ago.

Where the 1% live

They have to live somewhere and it appears that two of their favourite places are in the GLA constituency of Merton and Wandsworth. The Times's Bricks & Mortar supplement last Friday compared properties in parts of Wandsworth (the area round Wandsworth Common) and in Wimbledon (which is in the borough of Merton).

It appears that the average house price in that part of Wandsworth is £1.125 million. In Wimbledon it's £1.380 million. In Wandsworth 28% of property sales between January 2009 and September 2011 were for amounts between £1 million and £2 million and 12% for amounts above £2 million. In Wimbledon the figures for the same period were 36% and 20% respectively.

And who bought them? In Wandsworth 70% of these buyers came from "the business and financial services sector" and in Wimbledon 75%. So now we know what they spend some of their bonuses on.

The good news is that they make up only a tiny percentage of the populations of Merton and Wandsworth boroughs. The non-rich of these boroughs can easily outvote them if they decide to realise the worst fears of Col. Rich (yes, that was his name) in the debates that took place in the constituency, in Putney, in 1647:

You have five to one in this kingdom that have no permanent interest. Some men have ten, some twenty servants — some more, some less. If the master and servant shall be equal electors, then clearly those that have no interest in the kingdom will make it their interest to choose those that have no interest. It may happen that the majority may, by law — not in a confusion — destroy property; there may be a law enacted that there shall be an equality of goods and estate.

Yes we can — when we want.

Our rivals

Well, this is our first foray into contesting elections in Wimbledon; but we didn't expect our opponents to actually be a Womble (OK, I'm just envious that his beard is bigger and more ludicrous than mine). There is an interesting quote from their mayoral candidate:

Jenny Jones, who is running as the Green candidate for mayor in May’s election, said she would ensure the London Assembly dealt only with banks that could demonstrate they were lending to London’s small businesses.

Would these be the same small businesses who fund the Green party's campaign material by paying for advertising space in their "free sheet"? Of course they would be. The Green Party will stand up for its corporate backers and fiercely defend the market system and capitalism (as long as it is small capitalism). Hopefully, when I get some time of work, I'll be able to get out down there and maybe fling a few leaflets around, putting the case for Socialism and ending the need for bank lending altogether.

Our Election Address

Greater London Assembly elections 3 May 2012

It’s up to you

No politician can help you. They all say they are going to have to make you worse off because of the crisis. In other words, to make you poorer to protect the wealth of the 1% who own the world. It’s their system of making goods and services to sell for profit that led directly to the crisis. So long as we have this production for profit, we’ll have periodic crises and politicians wringing their hands over them.

The only way out is to change the rules of the game: to change the system by putting an end to minority ownership by replacing it with the democracy of common ownership by and for everybody. Enough resources, know-how and skills exist already to provide comfortably for everyone. It’s the profit system that prevents this. We need to do away with it and instead produce and access goods for needs.

At the moment so many people think that there’s no alternative that they are shrugging their shoulders and hoping for the best. If a few of us stand up and say “we will not put up with this, we want something better” then the idea that resources should be owned in common and used to satisfy people’s needs can get on the agenda as the only genuine alternative to capitalism and austerity.

We need to organise to bring about a world where the Earth’s resources have become the common heritage of all and where every man, woman and child on the planet can have free access to what they need to lead a decent and satisfying life.

If you want this, vote for the Socialist Party candidate in this election, to let people know where you stand, and then come and join us in campaigning for socialism.

The Socialist Party candidates are:

Lambeth & Southwark: Daniel Lambert
Merton & Wandsworth: William Martin

It's election time again

On 3 May electors in London will be voting for a new Mayor and also for the members of the Greater London Assembly. We're not standing for Mayor (even if we had the money) because we don't believe in mayors but we will be contesting two GLA constituencies: Lambeth & Southwark (as 4 years ago) and this time also Merton & Wandsworth.

One reason for contesting two constituencies is that, under the Boundary Commission's proposals for the 2015 General Election, 4 wards from Wandsworth will be joined with 4 wards from Lambeth to form a new Battersera & Wandsworth parliamentary constituency which we will probably contest.

The Socialist Party candidate in Lambeth & Southwark will be Danny Lambert and in Merton & Wandsworth Bill Martin

As always, we will be standing on a single platform: the need to establish socialism as a society based on common ownership and democratic control where goods and services are produced to meet people's needs instead of for profit. This has never been tried (and certainly not in Russia or China) and can only come about democratically when a majority want it.

Follow this blog for regular updates on the campaign.