Norfolk Boundary Review: "Coalition Stitch-Up"?

On my way home from work tonight I met one of Norwich Labour's hardest workers, standing on the street corner visably fuming. Little did I know that the Boundary Review had been leaked and if Guido is correct then Labour have a lot to worry about. My angry socialist friend went off on one about a "coalition stitch-up" which sees all the Tory and LibDem held seats get safer and thus more difficult for Labour to gain. Here in Norwich South there are no changes whatsoever, but Labour's view is that no matter where the boundaries took him Simon Wright is a (political) dead-man walking.

Not so long ago Labour held 3 seats in Norfolk - Norwich N, Norwich S and Yarmouth - with an outside chance of NW Norfolk in a very good year (e.g. 1997). In that year they also got very close to taking SW Norfolk it should be remembered but never actually achieved it.

And now what? With Great Yarmouth taking in the staunchly Conservative areas around the southern tip of North Norfolk, Tory MP Brandon Lewis will have even more blue-backing rural areas to "overwhelm" the Labour folk of GY. In addition, those changes would make North Norfolk safer for LibDem Norman Lamb - and even more so when the strongly LibDem (at General Elections, anyway) area around Fakenham are put back in the seat. That leaves just Norwich North where Chloe Smith will see her majority soar as she takes safe Tory territories of Drayton and Taverham back into her patch.

Despite changes, the new "Kings Lynn" seat is still well out of reach for Labour and "South Norfolk", "Broadland & Dereham" and "Thetford & Swaffham" equally so.

So for Labour their best case scenario of a Norfolk with 3 winnable seats is shot to pieces - just 1 (Norwich S) remains.

My Labour friend seethed and sweated. He believed that this is all a stitch-up to guarantee coalition seats in the county and deny Labour representation. Labour, I am told, will fight this all the way. He argued that Norfolk will have 8 safe seats and 1 marginal and so politics could become very boring indeed in the future.

We'll see. But this Boundary decision, I sense, is far from over.

Another Norwich Road

Saturday morning I was pleased to be able to head up to North Norfolk to help my old friend Trevor Ivory in his campaign to oust the LibDems. We went to Ludham and, in some kind of joke I assume, was given the Norwich Road to canvass. It was remarkable - house after house of Conservative voter. Yet this is a LibDem held district ward. Trevor has transformed the way in which the constituency party campaignins and works and it seems to be really paying off. They are pioneering some of the newest techniques and they seem to be working. From my day out in the sun, I have to say that if we give our Conservative voters the drive and enthusiasm to get into the polling station then this consistency may well yet be very close indeed.

Wanted: A Friend for the LibDem Council

Trevor Ivory has a brilliant post on his blog, and news item on his website, regarding the closure of the public toilets in Holt. The results of his survey - in which a third of the town took part - make astonishing reading, particularly the part about the council finding just a single supporter in their handling of the issue. Apparently local LibDem MP Norman Lamb has remained silent on the issue - how very unlike him. Bearing in mind that the survey was returned by more people than normally vote in local elections it certainly has some weight. During the days when local councils are fighting for their existence being this out of touch on a crucial issue like this won't help in the fight against Unitary.

With Holt now sporting the only UKIP Councillor for a long old distance, this move shows the serious fight that we are putting up in areas like this. The Conservatives are campaigning hard and showing themselves to be in touch with local people. I hope Trevor inspires other Conservatives!

North Norfolk Councillor defects to UKIP

One of the more significant stories buried in the news was that Cllr Mike Baker has quit the Conservative & Indepenent Group on North Norfolk District Council and has joined UKIP instead. Cllr Baker, who owns the local shop in his Holt Ward (!), is always elected as an Independent despite having well known Conservative views. His defection, such as it is, is a blow to local Conservatives but serves as a warning to Conservative associations up and down the county and the country.

For years Conservatives have given Tory-minded Independents a free run in elections, as Cllr Baker was, because they thought it was better to have an elected right-of-centre Independent than to split the vote and elect, say, a LibDem. All probably very true but the fact of the matter is that the majority of these Independent seats are in very strong Conservative areas rather than crucial marginals. If genuine Conservative candidates stood they'd probably win. Sometime a few years back the party made a political decision to give Independents who sat with Conservative groups a choice - join the party and stand as an official Conservative candidate or face an electoral challenge. One of the reason for the decline in the number of Independent Councillors over the past 6 years is the number that have joined the Tories or been beaten by them.

In the case of the member for Holt, the Conservatives didn't challenge him. Why not, as he wasn't and clearly isn't a Conservative?

If we had put up a Conservative and lost, and then he defected we could at least say that his crackpot decision to join UKIP was nothing to do with us. To not challenge him meant Conservatives using their votes to put this man in office. Are we, therefore, somehow responsible for delivering UKIPs newest recruit?

Church, Lunch, Beach, Garden

Apologies for the lack of posts - I am rather enjoying the post-election period at the moment and we found ourselves drawn along by the weather today. After going to mass at St. George's this morning, we then headed down to the Recruiting Sergeant for one of the best Sunday lunches we've had in a long time! After this we went to Mundesley for a trip to the beach. It was much colder on the North Norfolk coast than in the City so within hours we were back in the garden and finally enjoying the summer.

It's been a very sociable weekend all-in-all - yesterday, following a strategy meeting with the Town Close Conservatives, we had a get together at Dunstan Hall. Beautiful location and great food - although my pint of beer did manage to nearly blow up the bar when the tap went wrong and backfired! In the evening I stepped out with UEA Conservatives past and present - a social to launch their new blog, which can be found here. It is great to have a large and active Tory group at UEA and even better when they are fired up for the elections!

In fact, wherever have I found the time to facebook this weekend???

The secret of a successful blog is to update it regularly

... which I haven't been able to manage myself. Anyway, after last week's sheer amadness and a brief but very enjoyable holiday in North Norfolk I am back into the blog.

I learnt with some sadness of the demise of LibDem Voice today - a kind of poor man's ConservativeHome. I think all parties need these sort of sites but I have said before that LDV was too-loyal and spouted a lot of the cheery LibDem optimism that the rest of us hate - we're the real opposition, blah, blah, we actually won the 2007 election but nobody noticed, blah, blah, we're not sinking in the polls at all, blah, blah ... I advised that it started to really debate the issues in their party and people would accept a broad church at work rather than try to exploit divisions (rather like CH.com does rather well). Anyway, whatever its merits it will be missed even by rampant Tories like me!

Busy Weekend

Following on from last Sunday's fun, this weekend turns a little more to politics. Today I am heading over to Great Yarmouth to help support their excellent PPC Brandon Lewis and the Conservative council candidates. Yarmouth Borough Council is an excellent Tory-run authority but suffered a few losses last year (showing that being in power locally can be as off-putting as being in power nationally). They've takens ome tough decisions but Yarmouth is changing - for the better - beyond belief. They deserve our support.

After that I am going to campaign in North Walsham for local PPC Trevor Ivory who has made a flying start in the seat. It is worthy of note that Trevor is taking his campaign straight to heart of LibDem support in the constituency - a lot of people are coming today into an area once described to me as a "no go area for Tories." It would be easy for Trevor and his team to retreat into the any very strong Conservative areas but he isn't doing that - this is one fight he's taking to Lamb.

This evening Louise and I will be spending some real quality time together - Emily is off to Nanny & Granddad's house to eat her way through their biscuit tin - so we will be taking some time off! Sunday morning we are going to church and then I have to spend a few hours preparing for next week's full council meeting. The afternoon is a constituency officers meeting, followed by a Group Meeting and then finally (phew!) in the evening we get to see friends.

Congratulations!

It's going to be a busytime to be a Labour Councillor, or rather a boozy one perhaps, with the news that two of their number are to marry soon. Hot on the heels of former Lord Mayor Mick Banham, Sewell Councillor, announcing he is to marry I hear news that Bowthorpe's County Councillor Gail Loveday is also to wed. Hurrah! Both marriages are quite political - Cllr Banham's bride is the widow of Harry Watson and the new Mr Cllr Loveday is Phil Harris, Labour's former candidate in North Norfolk.

Congrats to all - new hats all round!

Well Done Trevor

I am thrilled to say that the latest Tory PPC to be selected in Norfolk & Suffolk is our local association Chairman Trevor Ivory, who will stand for the party in North Norfolk. I attended the Open Primary in Northrepps last Friday and what a good meeting it was. Trevor and Alan Lockwood, the defeated candidate, performed very well but it was so clear that Trevor wanted the seat badly.

Trevor and I are honest friends - I think that is a really difficult seat and he has one hell of a fight ahead of him. Trevor needs to work 24/7 on this one, but I have total confidence in him to really take the fight to Lamb. Trevor has been very brave taking a seat like this on, after all he follows the class political act of Iain Dale, and I am sure that local people will warm to him. Trevor and Lisa are now planning their move 20 miles North!

Trevor is a great champion of the Conservative cause ... North Norfolk should be proud to have him!