This Valentine’s Day, my CLP sent more than 2,000 cards to the electorate of Stretton ward in my constituency of Burton in East Staffordshire. A bit extreme you may think, but we had a council byelection on February 14th. So I spent the day (and those leading up to it) delivering leaflets and knocking on doors, to see what impression – if any – we could make in this strongly Conservative ward.
The final result wasn’t a surprise – Conservative hold. The story of the night was more of a concern, however. The BNP, who had never stood in this ward before and came a very close third. For those of you who have a taste for psephology the final count was:
Conservative – 661
Labour – 366
BNP – 327
Popular Alliance – 233
Liberal Democrats – 205
In terms of the share of the vote, the Conservatives fell by 12.7 per cent and our vote fell by 4.1 per cent, since last May’s elections. The BNP secured 18.2 per cent of the vote. We should have been able to anticipate the result, but to be frank I don’t think any of the mainstream political parties saw it coming.
With hindsight, the conversations on the doorstep were incredibly telling. Local issues should dominate local elections. Our biggest challenge is that the nature of what is local and what people care about has changed. People are genuinely concerned and in some cases scared about the local impact of both antisocial behaviour and immigration. And the BNP is exploiting their fears.
During the campaign all mainstream parties were repeatedly attacked on the doorstep for not having dealt effectively with the challenges posed by immigration to the area from both Europe and Asia. It was also claimed that we are not doing enough to directly tackle local gangs or deal with local crime. The Tory-run council also received a large amount of the blame, but this isn’t the time for inter-party recriminations.
We need to engage in the debate and acknowledge the concerns of the community; if we don’t we will be allowing the BNP to prosper. We need to establish our own dialogue, explaining why immigration is positive and community cohesion is a noble goal. Working with all community groups, local civic and charitable organisations we need to demonstrate real change on the ground. If we don’t take on this fight, then we are letting the BNP exploit our communities and win an argument that is already starting to have a detrimental impact on our society.
The Labour government has made huge strides in these areas and has launched countless initiatives. The challenge is now to make sure that the message gets through. We need to ensure that locally, people are no longer scared and they feel we are listening to them, supporting them and working for them.
In Burton we will keep fighting the good fight and work with all local community groups to combat the growing atmosphere of fear. The challenge for all of us in the next round of elections will be in London and we must do everything we can to keep the BNP out of the London Assembly. This requires leadership both nationally and also at a local level. We need to listen to our activists on the ground and make sure that our local campaigns reflect our combined local knowledge. Only this can help defeat the BNP.
On a personal note, after sending out over 2,000 Valentines cards – I only got one in return on the day – from my husband …
Ruth Smeeth is Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Burton