Reactions to the election results
Symon Hill gives an update on the elections
Friends have given contrasting reactions to last week’s election results. No Quakers, as far as the Friend understands, have been elected to the Scottish parliament or the Welsh or Northern Irish assemblies, although a number of Friends continue to serve as local councillors.
The severe backlash against the Liberal Democrats led to a defeat for Alex Cole-Hamilton of Central Edinburgh Meeting, who was hoping to become a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP). There were also at least two other Quakers seeking election to Holyrood; Morag Balfour and Pam Currie were both candidates for the Scottish Socialist Party.
The last Quaker MSP was Mark Ballard of the Green Party, who served from 2003-2007. There have been no Quaker MPs at Westminster since 2001.
Simon Beard of Littlehampton Meeting, who contested Sevenoaks District Council for the Liberal Democrats, told the Friend that his party had at times struggled to convey a clear message.
He insisted that they are still ‘standing up for liberal values and liberalism’ on issues such as human rights, Europe and migration. He said these issues ‘define us as a party much more than perhaps our position on the economy or on how to deliver social services’.
John Marjoram of Stroud Meeting, who was re-elected as a Green member of Stroud District Council, said he was not surprised that Liberal Democrat voters turned against the party once ‘they began to realise the depth of the cuts’. He accused the coalition of a ‘betrayal’ of the NHS.
He described the SNP’s success as a ‘pleasing surprise’ because of the party’s opposition to nuclear weapons and the war in Iraq. As well as being pleased with the national increase in the number of Green councillors, he is also ‘delighted that the BNP have done unbelievably badly’.
Comments
The LibDems are reaping what they’ve sown. For years they’ve campaigned in local elections with the line send a message to central government”. Now that they are in government, the voters have behaved themselves and done what they’ve been told to do and have kicked out LibDem councils in order to send a message to central government. In my local elections in Sheffield I saw almost nothing about the local candidates, almost every leaflet was banging on about central government. Consequently, the voters thought they could kick out Nick Clegg by throwing the LibDems out of the council. Now they have put Labour in control of the council, the voters are probably now wondering why Nick Clegg is still in government, VAT is still at 20%, student fees are still £9000, Education Maintenance Allowance hasn’t been restored. All main political parties are guilty of this deliberate confusion of local and central govenment and campaigning. In the 1980s in places like Sheffield there was an attitude of “I’m going to keep voting for Labour councillors *as* *hard* *as* *I* *can* until Thatcher is chucked out” regardless of the local consequences. The SNP should be congratulated for asking people to vote for who they *want* to run Scotland, not against who they *don’t* want to run Westminster.”
By jgharston on 20th May 2011 - 22:38
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