Surrey Labour Leadership event - Balls out

So it seems candidates will be even thinner on the ground tomorrow evening than previously thought. Questions to Ed Balls' campaign team bring the answer that Ed won't be anywhere near Surrey tomorrow.

Ben Bradshaw is going to be very lonely up there...

Labour Leadership hopefuls snub Surrey

So, the Labour Leadership contest is in full swing, with the candidates rushing around the country speaking at everything from public debates and think tanks to the opening of an envelope.

At a mere 17 miles from Westminster, you would think that the would-be Leaders of the Opposition would be keen to show their faces in Epsom and Ewell as a quick round trip. Sure enough, the Chair of the local Labour Party sent a letter to all members last month with the exciting news that David Miliband would be gracing Bourne Hall with his presence on Thursday 1 July. The other candidates were as yet unconfirmed, but would no doubt fall into line to avoid D-Mili hogging the limelight. In even more exciting news, this was to be the only event in Surrey during the entire campaign!

Sadly, all has not worked out well. An update e-mail went out today informing Members that the main Mili-man would not be able to make it down to the event, but was instead sending the smooth-talking doyenne of TV political chat Ben Bradshaw in his place. The other candidates are still unconfirmed.

But why wouldn't people go anyway, after all - "with no World Cup football on TV, there's no excuse!". No excuse indeed, but seemingly little point either. It seems that the Labour heavyweights are loathe to put themselves out even a few miles to speak in areas where their vote isn't high. A pity.

UPDATE:

In other news, rumours are circulating that local press are not being allowed to cover the event tomorrow night, in whatever form it takes. What have they got to say that's so secret?!

Epsom Council doesn't get it pt.94

I’ve never had much discipline as a blogger – hence the large gaps between posts on this site. Thankfully my local Borough Council normally manages to do something egregious enough to make me pick up my pen (well…laptop…) before long, and last night’s Strategy and Resources Committee meeting has afforded just such an opportunity.

One point at the meeting centred on petitions to the Council. Epsom and Ewell has a minimum 2% of population limit on all petitions before discussion is triggered at Council – effectively, if you don’t get more than 1,500 signatures, attention won’t be paid. Last night, Liberal Democrat and Conservative Councillors argued that this limit disregarded issues that were important, but only to a small percentage of the Borough’s population. A fair point – even in the furor that met the Council’s decision to deny the local Regiment the Freedom of the Borough last year we only managed just over 2,000 in our petition.

It seems, however, that the Residents’ Association isn’t so keen to change the rules. Councillor Eber Kington from Ewell Court ward went so far as to say that he didn’t want debates to have to be triggered by ‘residents’ backgarden’ issues. A moot point certainly, but it beggars belief that it is the Residents’ Association that is making it. The entire raison d’être of the RA is to localise politics; to ensure that national agendas are not followed in Epsom and Ewell; and that Residents can have direct representation on the Council. Their entire structure is based on Councillors being beholden to their locality through an Association Committee and Street Representatives. For Cllr. Kington to argue in this way seems to be completely against the objectives of his own group. I wonder how many Ewell Court residents are happy to see their local issues dismissed as NIMBYist posturing?

It saddens me that, yet again, the controlling party on the Council has not ‘got it’. If you are going to have a body allegedly run with direct input from local residents, then you have to listen to their concerns. Last night seems to be yet another erosion of the true few merits of the RA as an organisation. Added to the huge arguments going on in Stoneleigh and Auriol, where Councillors are ignoring the wishes of their RA Committee on the closure of the local conveniences (covered superbly, as ever, by the Epsom Guardian here and here), it surely can’t be long before these Councillors are finally called to account. Perhaps in the local elections next May? One can only hope…