Heap of praise

One wet morning in election week, I & some comrades were outside Seaview School at 8.30am, meeting the mums and getting them to sign our petition against cuts in the education budget, when Uriah Heap (Cllr Peter May the Lib-Dem candidate) emerged from a nearby house – and was as much surprised to see us standing in the road by the garden gate, as we were to see him. Where had he come from, had he materialised? We all pointed to him and shouted, "That's the man – he's the one going to cut your children's education" (or somesuch) and he scuttled back inside pronto. We didn't see him again – so I suppose he waited us out. That must have been a bit awkward.
However, you have to admire the Heap's dedication to the cause of the individual voter, that he was out so early (sometime before 8.30) on a very wet morning, canvassing. I'd also like to know how he had stayed so dry without a coat – I was soaked. You have to hope that after all that effort he got that vote.

Restart

I stopped doing this in the run-up to and during the election – I had neither the time nor (frankly) the energy – and then you rather get out of the habit. But the election's now done and dusted. So here I am having another go a trying to keep this blog up & running – I am probably not going to be any more successful than I was before! We'll see. I wonder how many 'Restart programmes' I'm allowed? So a few catch-up items will follow.

I spent all my campaigning time in Swansea West (largely with Don – sorry Lord – Anderson) – so I am particularly gratified at the result. I know that the Lib-Dems are claiming it a victory, but then we all know that they have difficulties with truth and reality. Yes Alan Williams majority was reduced, but that has to be judged in context. This was the number one Lib-Dem target n Wales, enormous sums were spent on their campaign, with an enormous team, shovelling out huge amounts of papers. Rumours are that they spent over £40,000 – it was certainly fairly reliable suggested that they had a local campaign fund of over £30,000. No doubt Lib-Dem insiders are scoffing at these figures – "if only he knew how much we really spent". Well no doubt some anorak or other will have a quick shufty at their expenses when they are published and then we will be able to compare that truth with the reality.

This had always been a marginal seat – I think Alan Williams was down to about a 400 majority at one election - and Labour were widely expected to lose. This prediction was assisted by a largely unpopular Labour Government in Westminster (that seemed more interested in its own internal squabbling than governing the country), a very unpopular Prime Minister (whose standing/credibility was not helped by shenanigins of the 'Blairistas' in the Parliamentary Party. Who did they think they were helping?), MPs expenses, the press (including the Guardian sadly) against us, the ridiculous Cleggmania and all the rest of it. The result in Swansea West was therefore a surprise to many – not least Uriah Heap, who almost collapsed when he found he wasn't going to get his train tickets up to the 'Smoke'. It was all the more pleasing as the Lib-Dems had been going around for weeks saying that the election "was in the bag" – yes but not theirs.

It wasn't of course a surprise to us on the doorstep – our returns indicated a win with a reduced majority, although I admit not quite as small as it turned out. But hey, a win is a win!

I must also pay tribute to the assistance of Uriah Heap himself. It's a pity that his husting's performances were not captured on film as they would have become classics of the genre and I would have been able to keep them alongside my video footage of Bethan Jenkins' 'aircraft carrier for Wales' interview, John Redwood singing the National Anthem and Cheryl Gillan looking forward to working with Rhodri Morgan as Wales' First Minister. I have keep Rob Speht's prescient EPost comment, given at the Swansea East count, that they had won Swansea West, that it had been a foregone conclusion. And only then was he told that they'd actually lost. Ho Ho.

During one part of the count Uriah ran through the bar at the Brangwyn Hall, punching the air and shouting, "We've done it! We've done it!". Only twenty minutes later being told that, "..erm...sorry, no you haven't". It was only the strong comforting arm of his agent, ex-Cllr Gerald Clement, that kept the by then limp candidate in the vertical axis. I suppose that I should feel sorry for the Heap, a bit magnanimous in victory, but I don't. He ran a nasty campaign and got the result he deserved. I have never been at an election count previously where a candidate had been so universally disliked as Uriah Heap at this one (and that included some in the Lib-Dem camp who were quietly (and some not so quietly) delighted at his defeat). The downside is that we still have him as the Cabinet Member for Housing. Well, we'll have to make sure that we welcome him with appropriate kindness!

Uriah Heap's loser's speech at the last Assembly election was very ungracious. His effort this time was simply disgraceful. Crass, graceless in the extreme and very, very long. It seemed that once he'd started, he was unable to stop. Certainly, his thanks to the communities of the constituency that (he claimed) had voted for him seemed interminable as he appeared to be reading from a Bartholomew's A-Z. He didn't seem to have twigged that if they had done what he'd claimed, he'd have made the victory speech instead. There was just the first few slaps of a slow-hand clap starting, when he stopped.