Posts Tagged ‘committee’

Barry Gardiner’s elephant

09/06/2010, 02:21:42 PM

Since they got (back) to Westminster, Labour MPs have been assaulted by a relentless barrage of vote-begging letters from their Parliamentary colleagues. There are or have been elections for the leadership, the deputy speakerships, all party groups, backbench committees and a host of select committee chairs. There are shadow cabinet and select committee membership elections to come.

Everybody is sick of it.  Most of the letters are dull and unremarkable.  There has generally been no reason to inflict them on Uncut readers.

There are two that stick out, though.

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Rob Carr recommends a rest

18/05/2010, 09:47:01 AM

Now is a time for recovery for election activists.  Whether from dog-bites, worn feet or just our general levels of sanity.  There are no more major elections for a year.  Party conference isn’t until September.  Now is the time for us to get together in committee rooms, pubs, and around kitchen tables. To enjoy each other’s company.  To be refreshed.  A time to share our tales from the campaign.  Whether it’s stories of ever-larger dogs we have faced down in our mission to deliver leaflets.  Ever smaller letter boxes snapping on our fingertips.  Ever soggier leaflets falling apart in our rain-soaked hands.  

Or memories like the man who told me and a roomful of campaigners that he was going to break into his old house to retrieve his postal vote so he could cast it for Labour.  (We talked  him out of it, in case you’re wondering. He went to his polling station.)   There was the voter who answered his door naked while I was canvassing one evening.  An unpleasant experience, but a confirmed Labour vote all the same.  Or the moment when Labour Party nobility, Sir Jeremy Beecham, popped his head round the corner as I was canvassing and started miming at me.  Surreal then, but hilarious in the pub later. And – my personal favourite of the 2010 election – the Labour promise whom,  on election day,  I had to convince hadn’t cast her vote the previous week via Facebook.  I’ve no doubt we all have a good collection of similar stories and experiences to tell,  and now is the time to relax,  reflect,  and enjoy them.

But not for too long.  Just long enough to ready ourselves for the battles to be joined. Because once we’re done resting and reminiscing about the various characters, the incidents tragic and comic, and the madness of polling day, we have to start thinking about what comes next.  Gordon Brown has returned to the back benches for the first time in 20 years. With the loss of the election, we’ve come to a natural time to pause and review. Now is when we think about new direction, new policy, and new leaders.

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