My congratulations to Roger Gale's team in NTCA for having his circular through my door by 1400 today!
Roger will have my support this year, yet again, simply because I believe he has been a jolly good MP for North Thanet and because Dane Valley Ward is still in his constituency. I have not been entirely happy with his view on China Gateway and his past support of the 'Ezekielites' but that is now history. His Labour opposition is so low key as to be derisory and I have yet to see what the Lib Dems have in mind. I think that it is a safe prediction to make that Roger will be returned by the electorate to Westminster on 6th May.
Steve Ladyman over at Thanet South is in an interesting position. Boundary changes have meant that he has lost Sholden to Dover and Minster and Monkton to Roger Gale in N. Thanet but now has Cliftonville West and Cliftonville East in South Thanet. There are many in these wards who have never bothered to get out and vote Labour as they have taken the view that Roger Gale was un-assailable; that might well now change. It is also interesting that Steve Ladyman has been working for 2 years (post Transport Minister) as a very good constituency MP and gaining a great deal of respect locally as a good Thanet MP, as has Roger Gale on the north side.
Whilst Laura Sandys, has been working hard as prospective parliamentary candidate for Thanet South for a long time, she is still perceived as a Cameron 'choice' parachuted into to mix it with the locals and quite frankly has not made the impact that she would have hoped for. She has also to face the 'Ezekilite' factor in Thanet South and in Cliftonville that last month's change of Leader might perhaps have been too late to alter perceptions. For too long, Conservative TDC has been perceived dimly by its electorate and many might now avoid voting for Laura as a simple protest against their Conservative Council. There is no doubt that the Thanet electorate does its own thing and perhaps that is healthy.
After a rapid analysis in the 'Strife' Office, the collective view is that Thanet will still have the same faces as our MPs after 6th May and that perhaps that is no bad thing.
If the rest of the country decide that Brown et al are worth another 5 years then heaven help us but that is what democracy is all about, isn't it?
9 comments:
If Bertie's prediction for 'No Change' in the two Thanet constituencies proved correct, then it is a case of heaven alone can help us - we would be facing five more years of Gordon and ZANU/Labour. Since Thanet South is well within the must win seats for the Conservatives, to miss out on it would mean that Labour are back. Thereafter, in another five years there would be little worth campaigning for, always assuming that the power crazed would ever allow us another free election. As for Ladyman being a good constituency MP, my own experience is that he has failed miserable on the four issues I have taken up with him.
Yes Bertie. Steve Ladyman and I have had our differences. However I vouch for the good constituency MP work Janet Ladyman recently carried out for a client of mine.
Two solicitors had given up on winning the matter at Judicial Tribunal. I came up with a strategy but needed the Ladymans to add clout by writing to a Govt Dept MP liaison Unit. They did so a number of times and this played no small part in our win at Judicial Tribunal and subsequent win in follow up decision making.
I wrote Steve Ladyman an apology last year. Not for the case I make because clearly I am right and Steve is wrong. But I pursued it in an inappropriate fashion at a time I was unaware of a sad event in the Ladymans' life.
I received a gracious letter back accepting my apology.
Maybe he ain't all bad. Just need him to be guided by wiser counsel (such as myself) re anti-terrorism and the uselessness of Kent Police?
I think you may well be right. Thanet no change.
She is apparently responsible for the demise of Ezekiel but as you say too late? Also she has the same tarnished crew canvassing for her? Would you commit your vote to one of the Ezekiel party disguised as a Tory. I am with you that my impression of the traditional party has been sorely tested by the image projected of the local Councillors, with a few exceptions!
Hope you are proved wrong about no change Bertie but certainly TDC needs to be reformed no more tarnished characters please?
Did you see the One show? Proves why we need only one major for Thanet and what a gravy train it is -any excuse for Shirley Tomlinson to put a hat on and give her sickly fake smile has to be stopped?
Rock, the boundary changes appear to have not only confused Your Thanet and STCA but clearly commentators on ECR. Cliftonville East has not only disenchanted traditional Conservatives but Labour supporters who never bothered to vote as Roger Gale was secure. We might see Labourites coming out to vote this time for a 'sitting' Labour MP and disenchanted local tories making a point.
Cliftonville West, however, that reaches way into Margate, could be regarded as very much Labour territory! The boundary changes do not make life easier for Laura Sandys.
18:45, an interesting observation concerning the demise of 'yesterday's man'.I think it would be fair to say that the STCA are the guys in the white hats in regard to restoring proper Conservatism to TDC and that Laura has a good team behind her. We will have to wait and see if they can do enough in the next few weeks. Steve Ladyman has served Thanet well as both a Cllr and an MP. Thanet has a history of bucking the national trend which is refreshing.
Accept all that has been commented on the local scene but the national is far more important. Since Thanet is part of the UK, like it or not, can we stand another five years of the sort of governance that has been delivered by Brown's shower. I doubt it so, to get rid of them, Steve Ladyman, whatever his attributes, has to go. It is tough but any halfway decent party would have rewarded him with a safer seat for all he has done for them.
Bertie, Ladbrokes have also apparently been confused by the boundary changes which are not, of course, confined to Cliftonville. Check out the odds for, if you are right in your prediction, it could be worth a flutter!
Having just got back from a trip to Pegwell Nature Park Laura has loads of billboards up, I never saw a single Labour poster. I dislike Ladyman and wish Laura Sandys every success. She has helped us at Saint Paul's something no likes doing.
What makes me cross is that none of the three main parties have said anything much about the need for tax and welfare reform in this country. Clearly, none like the idea of being the nasty party.
According to Sunday Telegraph figures printed right after the budget the other week, this country now spends £196 billion on welfare in all its forms - but not including, as far as I could tell, old age pensions. This staggering sum is more than the national debt and is about £70 billion more than the cost of the NHS. Education and Defence respectively take up £50 billion and £40 billion (not enough in my opinion).
On the income side, the govt receives £146 billion in income tax, and £25 billion each, more or less, from council tax and business rates.
It doesn't take a master mathemitician to work out that those three forms of taxation added together equal that spend on welfare.
There are some very simple solutions here. Abolish all welfare payments and income tax and the country will have £50 billion over to pay off some of its debts. There will be little or no need for tax collectors (yippee) and thereby you will also eliminate tax and benefit frauds - simply because they will no longer exist. The government will also have the added benefit of being able to cut thousands of civil service jobs and save even more money.
The long term unemployable/unemployed will have all the incentive they need to find work, or if they choose not to bother, they can carry on in their old way without incurring public expense.
Importantly, we would no longer have the situation where people avoid work because they can get more money from handouts. Illegal immigrants would no longer see Britain as a soft touch and would decide to stay in their own countries. No more disgruntled middle class wondering why they bother to work to support the skivers either.
Piece of cake really!
Disgruntled member of middle classes
I doubt that local factors will have much to do with the eventual result. Both outgoing MPs are almost entirely at the disposal of the popularity - or otherwise - of their parent Parties nationally. Personalities count for little, as do the "local people" in local government elections; almost everything is determined by the public's opinion of the (national)government of the day.
This is sad for me because, in my humble opinion, Roger Gale is a very bad MP. I realise that Thanet North is fundamentally blue, but a candidate with such archaic, traditionalist, and right-wing views should be made to stand aside in favour of a more modern thinker. Gale's stance on virtually every social issue is offensively outmoded. He is also prone to extreme pomposity and arrogance. I fully acept that others hold different views, as they are, and I am, entitled to do.
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