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Respect to the vote-counters After a recount, the Reform Party were declared the winners of the Runcorn and Helsby by-election by six votes. The first time they counted, Reform’s margin of victory was four votes.
Assuming the second result is accurate, the first result was off by two. Not bad considering 32,740 votes were cast.
Not a bad result for Reform, either. Sarah Pochin is Runcorn’s first MP from any party other than Labour in 52 years. If that result had come from the bowels of a voting machine many Labour supporters would have distrusted it. Because the count and the recount took place under the eyes of multiple observers – courtesy of the Sun live-streaming it, you can watch all three hours and twenty one minutes of the process here if you want to – few now will.
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My suspicion is that the Conservatives have still not recovered from their indolence and Labour is trying to ride too many horses at once (immigrant and anti-immigrant, Net Zero and growth, profligate spending and austerity, class war and wealth creation, Woke and anti-woke).
It is pleasing to me that another party has seized the opportunity exposed by the failure of the two main established parties.
DJ,
Very nice summary of what’s up with Tories and Labour. As to the latter it’s the left in general. I mean trans-ideology and feminism? Queers for Palestine?
– Tom Stoppard, Jumpers
Overall a good result. Now, with Reform councillors taking power, we can start to see how well they do with some measure of power and responsibility.
As Paul Marks points out, the new Reform councillors will now have to confront “policy”. This is what the Blob wants, and is nothing to do with the wishes of the great unwashed who still believe voting changes anything. It will be interesting to see how that plays out.
My prediction regarding any changes or “cuts” to the council bureaucracy that Reform want.
1) There will be strikes quickly organised by the council workers that perform the things that the rate payers pay for and actually want (e.g bins emptied, schools, local libraries etc.) that will become intolerable in the short term (see Birmingham, for example).
2) The politically correct, DEI stuff (e.g. support for Ethiopian wheel chair using transgender lesbian underwater basket weaving classes, Climate Change, ensuring Garden Gnomes reflect the correct level of diversity of the cities etc.) will carry on regardless and increase.
3) The press, BBC etc. report the utter failure of the newly elected Reform parties to govern competently due to the disruption caused by the withdrawal of services that are actually needed.
4) Lawfare by the unions against any changes at great expense to everyone (except the unions)
5) An increase in rates to repair the damage to council services, funding and the staff numbers. Totally necessary, of course.
In short, deliberate sabotage.
Prove me wrong …
The vote counting in my own area was slow – as it was during the Police Commissioner elections of a couple of years ago.
Indeed having been there for seven hours yesterday was the second time in my life that I have left a count before the end – my own defeat had been decided and I shook hands with the victorious Greens and left. I have to be back today for my defeat in the Town Council elections (yes a full day was not enough time to deal with counting the votes).
The Green Party campaign was “we are nice young people who go litter picking and are active in the community” (words repeated by many voters – so it clearly was an effective presentation) – there was no mention of “Net Zero” high energy prices or causing chaos in Bristol and Brighton – but then the Conservative Party leaflets had no mention of all this either as we were told that our leaflets had to be “positive” (translation – useless).
The Reform Party campaign was a very traditional political campaign of wild lying (highly effective in political history) – supposedly we in North Northants council had run up debts of 430 million Pounds (we have balanced the budget every year) spent on our pay and perks – with me being on 75 thousand Pounds a year plus many thousands of Pounds in expenses. I was actually on 15 thousand Pounds a year and have never made an expense claim in my life.
There was also demands (from Mr Farage – who came to Kettering) to “send in the auditors” “audit the accounts” – and so on, this was repeated endlessly, in spite of many thousands of Pounds being spent on audit work (internal and external) every year. Four years of audit committee meetings were obviously a figment of my imagination – as was all the money spent on auditors (none of whom ever came up with a suggestion for saving money).
As for the real pressures on local government, Adult Social Care and Children’s Services (both “demand led”, i.e. blank cheque, services – demanded by national law) they were not mentioned at all.
By the way – in case anyone thinks I have been unfair to single out the Reform Party for lying (although I do admit to being irritated by the pretense that I am thief who has stolen vast sums of money from the taxpayers), the national (national – not local) Conservative Party campaign was also dishonest – or ignorant.
Every time I watched Kemi on television or read a social media post from Kemi – the line was “lower council tax” and “better services” – Council Tax has to go UP by 4.9% every year (if in an authority that has responsibility for Adult Social Care and Children’s Services) and services are under great strain – all this is to fund Adult Social Care and Children’s Services, both “demand led” services established by national law.
Every time I heard (or read) the lady say “lower taxes” or “lower council tax” and “better services” I had to look away – as the statements were so lacking in basic reality.
By the way…. both Adult Social Care and Children’s Services can be dealt with better – for example, by reducing layers of management, and by buying and OWING the homes for children (rather than paying mortgages of private providers – who then get to keep the properties the taxpayers have paid for), but even doing all this – the costs (by national law) go UP not down every year – so “lower taxes” is a strange claim to make, in the background of Council Tax going up by 4.9% every year. As for “better services” – 149 million Pounds in road repair money (from the cancelled HS2 project) was TAKEN AWAY from North Northants council by the new government, as was 5 million Pounds in arts money.
“But there must be an alternative Paul” – there is, the alternative is bankruptcy (in fact if not in name), and the national government then (after spending lots of money on commissioners and so on) giving permission for Council Tax (for a local authority with responsibility for Adult Social Care and Children’s Services) to increase Council Tax by far MORE than 4.9% per year.
All of the above is rather complicated – so people prefer “we are nice young people who go litter picking and are active in the community” or “Paul Marks is a thief who has taken vast sums of money from you for his pay and expenses – send in the auditors!”
Turning away from the mess of “private providers” (for children, or for roads or whatever – IEA and ASI 1980s ideas that have not turned out well in the long term – as the corporations, and other such, run rings round local government officers) – there is the basic reason WHY Adult Social Care and Children’s Services keep going up in cost.
The reason for the explosion of costs of Adult Social Care and Children’s Services is the breakdown in traditional society – the replacement of traditional society (traditional family, including extended families, and both religious and secular fraternal groups) with the mess that the Fabians and the Bloomsbury Set advocated from the early 1900s and has been POLICY (as JohnK rightly calls it) since the 1960s.
Well the cultural left has won (traditional society has been smashed) – and the result is utter disaster (which, I believe, was their aim all along). And things are going to get a lot worse – as social breakdown (deliberately engineered social breakdown) proceeds.
Great observation, rings true.
The counters have stopped counting – a few days after the council elections, yes efficient by American standards (where counting seems to take for ever) – but not like the old Britain, where there was an “Election Night” with votes counted within a few hours of the close of poll.
It is not the fault of the counters – it is the organisation or lack of it, many of the old skills are lost. At least here – not (as Natalie points out) in Runcorn and Helsby.
Kettering now has a town council (it only has the powers of a Parish Council – unlike the Borough of Kettering that existed up to four years ago) all but one of whom is a Green Party person.
“So the people of Kettering support a pre industrial society where 90 to 95% of the present population could not survive?” – NO, not at all. According to the voters the Green Party people are “nice young people who go litter picking and care about the community” – some (some) voters also made it clear, on local internet groups, that they did NOT wish to hear about policies – they valued how much people cared. Feelings-not-thought.
Not much an example of arid-Red-Sea-Pedestrian-rationalism like myself can do about that – I lack the higher feeling, the spiritual compassion, that is craved.
Paul: I agree, last year our local candidate was raging about the complete rubbish the National Party was imposing, throwing away hours of locally-produced literature covering local issues. As a result, we were trounced where previously we’d been building up our vote.
I’ve been seeing it for two decades now, the more The Party centralises (whichever party), the worse they perform locally.
jgh – here it was two things (apart from the national mess – which we both agree on).
Reform Party claims about corrupt councilors taking vast amounts of money, supposedly running up debts of hundreds of millions of Pounds on our pay and expenses.
And the Green Party message – of do-not-think-feel. Whether it was voting for “Ben and Ben” (the two Green candidates in this ward happened to have the first name of Benjamin – but go by “Ben” and both activists and voters chanted “Ben and Ben” in a sort of sing-song way) or other Green candidates – all things are possible as long as one has a heart full of compassion, if one is a person of finer feeling – not arid rationalism.
Oddly enough the same people might vote Reform Party for the Unitary Authority, and then Green Party for the Town Council election (where there were often not Reform Party candidates).
Voting for the Reform Party AND the Green Party might seem odd, as they are supposed to be on the opposite ends of the political spectrum – but they both appealed to feelings.
All things are possible, all your wishes will come true, if you just stop thinking – and put absolute trust and faith in Nigel Farage.
Or – all things are possible, all your wishes will come true, if you just stop thinking – and put absolute trust and faith in the Green Party.
I’d much rather give Farage a try than ever again trust the party that spent 14 years building the road to ruin that Labour are now driving the country down.
Curious – do you consider yourself a Czech now, or an Englishman-in-exile?
Perry – I trust Nigel Farage when he says he is NOT going to even try to address changing demography. No mass deportations of illegals – and so on.
When he said that, and he did, I believed him. Ditto I believed Mr Farage when he said he would not oppose Islam.
When Mr Farage came to my home town and told lies about me (and others), claiming I had taken vast sums of money, building up debts of hundreds of millions of Pounds to fund my lavish pay and expenses. – I did NOT believe him, because he lied. The budget of North Northants Unitary Authority was balanced every year of its existence. I was not paid vast sums of money (contrary to the lies of Mr Farage and his Cult members) – I was on 15 thousand Pounds a year, and I have never claimed expenses.
The Reform Party election campaign was based on vicious lies – even by the low standards of politics.
“Send in the auditors” – as if we did not spend thousands of Pounds on audit work (internal and external) every year.
Paul:
Commiserations on losing your seat. It must be galling to know it had nothing to do with you, and everything to do with CCHQ.
According to Sunday Times Farage may have met over 1200 council candidates in the campaign.
Starmer and Badenoch were pretty invisible in contrast.
I’m aware Farage has weaknesses but if he was as toxic as he’s claimed to be, well, I have to conclude that Starmer and Badenoch are even more toxic!
Martin:
You are almost certainly right.
Surprisingly good observation in the Guardian:
Across the conventional political spectrum you can find bigwigs lining up to say Farage is appalling and a chancer, apparently without realising what that then makes them. Namely, someone people find less appealing than that guy.
JohnK.
I have no love for CCHQ – after all they came for me in 2019 (although there have been a couple of twists in that story that I was not aware of till recently – for example it may well be that the Guardian story was just an excuse, and the real reason Central Office wanted to get rid of me was my open contempt for Mrs May, even though this person was no longer leader when they came for me) – but they did NOT come to my home town and accuse me of taking lots of money.
This is what Mr Farage did – in Kettering Conference Centre.
Yes the same building where I, and others, stood with him in 2016 – he lied about Conservative councilors.
And the Reform Party paid for four separate bits of election literature repeating the same lies.
Well the corrupt Conservative councilors are no longer running up hundreds of millions of Pounds of debt to fund our pay and expenses – so all will be well now.
The good people of Kettering (indeed all of North Northants) will now get wonderful services and lower Council Tax – because the corrupt Paul Marks is no longer stealing money from them.
Still – I might be accused of avoiding the thrust of what JohnK is saying, so I will address it.
YES – whenever I heard the national (national) Conservative campaign talk about “lower taxes and better services” it made me feel ill.
They know (they KNOW) that local authorities with legal responsibility for Adult Social Care and Children’s Services have to (have to) increase Council Tax by (at least) 4.9% every year – and they know that services (such as roads, libraries and so on) are under terrible pressure.
So how could they (including the leader) keep saying “lower taxes” and “better services” – over and over again?
I noticed that Robert Jenrick generally avoided using these terms – but Kemi kept saying it, again-and-again-and-again.
It was unbearable.
I am no saint – I am very worldly (far too worldly), but I could not stand it, I am still stricken by it.