ALB
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True, the SNP have transformed themselves from Tartan Tories into Tartan Reformists but has Alex Salmon ever spoken in these terms as the current leader of Plaid Cymru, Leanne Wood has:http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2012/mar/23/leanne-wood-wales-plaid-cymru
Quote:"Socialism is an old-fashioned word and for some people an offputting word. But I describe myself as a socialist. Plaid Cymru has socialism in our aims, to create a decent socialist world."She's right. The word "socialism/sosialaeth" does occur in its constitution as one of its aims:http://www.plaidcymru.org/uploads/Cyfansoddiad_Nov_2012.pdfOf course they are not socialists but at least they are not afraid of the word.
Members and others have got to buy this week's Private Eye (out today) to see the cartoon report of West London's Euroelection meeting. It's accurate and quite funny.
Just checked and see we also did relatively well in Portsmouth (7th out of 67 for us in terms of percentage, after Oxford, Brighton, Hastings, Canterbury, Lewes and Southampton). Maybe this had something to do with the comrade who put and defended our position in the comments section of the local newspaper (as well as Royal Mail's delivery of our manifesto to half the households there). Scroll down to the comments section here to see the comrade's two contributions:http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/local/european-elections-the-full-rundown-1-6070283
Our man in Spain, Alberto, is already on to this. By co-incidence he phoned yesterday to say he had arranged to meet Pablo Iglesias and ask him why the new party only criticised corruption, etc but never mentioned capitalism. No doubt he will be reporting back. In the meantime we can contact them via their website.At first glance they seem to be similar to the Your Voice Party that stood in the South east Region in the recent Euroelections, i.e. no particular policy except that any policy should be decided democratically by the citizens through referendums and the internet (isn't that what the Pirate Party advocates too?). But immensely more succesful in terms of votes. They got 1.245.948 compared to Your Voice's 2932.
alanjjohnstone wrote:Can i ask how much we spent – the cost of standing, the leaflets and video and how much each individual vote cost us. (exclude the candidates travelling expenses to hustings etc).We spent about £15,000 in the campaign in the SE Region (£10,000 for 984,000 leaflets + £5000 deposit) and about £11,600 In Wales (£2750 for the election video, £3850 for 342,000 leaflets + £5000 deposit).Standing entitled us to free postal distribution of our election leaflet and, in Wales, to an election broadcast on BBC and ITV (on different days).
Can you tell those of us who are not subscribers to RevLeft what the result was (it says you have to register to see it). Did the ICC recommend spoiling the ballot box?
And here's our next best after Oxford, Brighton and Hastings:Southampton: http://www.southampton.gov.uk/Images/Southampton%20Area%20Result_tcm46-357779.pdfCanterbury: https://www.canterbury.gov.uk/your-council/voting-elections/european-parliamentary-election/Lewes: http://www.lewes.gov.uk/council/21933.aspLewes (beat the BNP again) is particularly impressive as this was not one of the places where we had Royal Mail deliver our leaflets, only a couple of thousand distributed by a member (one of our candidates) and a sympathiser.After that it's Dover, Shepway, Eastbourne (!), Milton Keynes. Reading was a disappointment.
Here's the result for Brighton:http://www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/content/council-and-democracy/voting-and-elections/european-parliamentary-electionsIt's not actually our best in terms of percentage (Oxford was) but it's the best-looking one, in terms of absolute numbers and beating the three main nasty minor parties (BNP, Christians, English Democrats).
Here's another place where we did much better than average (in fact more than two times better): Hastings on the South Coast.http://www.hastings.gov.uk/decisions_democracy/voting_petitioning_having_your_say/elections_voting/electionresults/?elecdate=22052014&electype=europeanThis is one of the areas where Royal Mail distributed our leaflet to all households and is the scene of Robert Tressell's The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists (though he called it Mugsborough).
Here is the result from the Oxford Local Counting Area:http://www.oxford.gov.uk/Library/Documents/Elections/Declaration%20of%20results.pdfNote that, as well as us getting more votes than the BNP and the equally nasty "English Democrats" ("English jobs for English workers"), even the LibDems got more votes than UKIP as Claudia pointed out. Sounds like an oasis of sanity where parties lose votes if they shout "immigrants out".
One other obvious way to follow-up this election is to seriously consider contesting Oxford West & Abingdon and Brighton Kemptown in next May's General Election. We've got members and now supporters and contacts in both.
Just seen the results for London:http://londoneuroelections.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/European-Election-Results-for-London-Region-2014-181KB-pdf.pdfand see that No2EU, supported by SPEW and the CPB together, got 3804 votes, or 0.17%. Confirmation that London is less xenophobic than the rest of the country, but surely this must mean the end of this organisation as I can't see Bob Crow's successor as RMT General Secretary wasting any more of the union's political fund on it (and SPEW never really believed in it anyway but were just going along with it to get Crow's money for TUSC).
Someone on our facebook page has worked out the percentage we got in each of the 22 "local counting areas" in Wales. Some interesting points arise (which might require the above analysis to be revised).Those with an above average (above 0.19) are:Rhondda Cynon Taff 0.29% (147 votes)Gwynedd 0.27 (80 votes)Swansea 0.26 (139 votes)Ceredigion 0.23 (48 votes)Vale of Glamorgan 0.22 (76 votes)Merthyr Tysfil 0.22 (26 votes)Wrexham 0.21 (63 votes)Neath Port Talbot 0.21 (73 votes)Cardiff 0.20 (160 votes)Bridgend 0.20 (60 votes)On the surface these have nothing in common. Our election leaflet was delivered by Royal Mail in parts of the Rhondda, Gwynedd, Swansea, Wrexham, Neath and Cardiff. Members and sympathisers distributed a limited number in the Vale of Glamorgan and Bridgend, but none were in Ceredigion. In fact there (which includes Aberystwyth and its university) all they would have had would have been the election broadcast, other BBC Wales interviews and what they saw on the ballot paper. Gwynedd and Ceredigion are, with Anglesey, the most Welsh-speaking areas of Wales. What distinguishes them is that there is a well-established university in both, Bangor in one and Aberystwyth in the other, which means that they will have a younger, more outwardly-looking group. This would go some way to explain why we nearly outvoted No2EU in both these (48 to 56 in Ceredigion and 80 to 100 in Gwynedd). UKIP did badly there with the Welsh Nationalists topping the poll. But unlike Scottish Nationalism Welsh nationalism is leftwing (its current leader even claims to be a socialist).I'm not sure what the implications of all this are for our future activity in Wales but there must be something there to build on in time for the Welsh Assembly elections in 2016.
Ed wrote:Unless of course we put that down to votes being cast for us in the SE due to the lack of 'competition' from left wing parties. In which case perhaps we did not convey the fact that we are not a left party strongly enough.Actually, the result in the South East in percentage terms is almost exactly the same as it was in the London Region last time, in 2009, when we got 4050 votes (0.2%) when faced with both SLP and No2EU "competition":http://spgb.blogspot.co.uk/2009/06/result.htmlWithout such competition this time we still get 2 in a 1000 votes. So, I don't think we can be accused of vote-catching opportunism.
Ed wrote:I thought we recieved a higher percentage of the vote in the south east than we did in Wales. 0.19% in Wales compared to 0.23% in SE. Unless of course we put that down to votes being cast for us in the SE due to the lack of 'competition' from left wing parties. In which case perhaps we did not convey the fact that we are not a left party strongly enough.I think my hypothesis (confirmed by other examples) that we do better in Labour than in Tory areas still stands. As the results from Rhondda and to a certain extent Neath (areas where we had our manifesto distributed to every household) show, if we had had them distributed in the other ex-mining and solid Labour areas too (where our results were ridiculous: 23 in Blaneau Gwent, which includes Ebbw Vale were Aneurin Bevan and Michael Foot were MPs, and 26 in Merthyr, where Kier Hardie was once MP) we'd have got more votes in Wales. Whether they'd be fully socialist rather than nostalgic trade union conscious votes is another matter.As I said in the thread on the election in Wales I don't regard No2EU as being "left" even in the confused sense of this term. If it's any consolation to you, when I spoke in the hustings in Lewisham someone asked all those on the platform who considered themselves leftwing to put their hand up. I didn't (nor did Lewisham People before Profit) while No2EU, the Greens and the National Health Action Party did.
