Saturday campaigning in Speke Garston byelection

Another great day on "the stump" in Speke Garston.

There was lots to do, leaflets to deliver, doors to knock, posters to get up in windows.

Cllr Doreen Knight and I chose to go doorknocking on Alderwood Avenue in Speke, forgive me if I got the street name wrong, it is not my patch.

We knocked on loads of houses all morning until the need for a hot drink pushed us back to the committee rooms. I dont know where the LibDems are looking to for votes, one has to imagine they are still relying on Garston, because once again we found only Labour voters on the doorstep. Even before we got there someone had organised a terrific spread of Labour window posters. You dont see them much any more, they went out of fashion about 8 years ago as far as I can determine, but in Speke there are loads of posters. We went past one particular row at the top end of the street where every house was voting for Colin Strickland. Amazing.

We were chatting, Doreen and I, to a lady on one doorstep. She had just agreed to put a poster up in support of Labour's Colin Strickland, when coming along the street we spied four LibDem councillors from elsewhere in the city. They were leafletting. They wisely left our house alone and leafletted the one before and the one after.

There they were, not meeting voters, not talking to anyone who lived there, not engaging with anyone, even those standing at their gates, as they walked past house after house of Labour posters, while Cllr Doreen Knight and I were chatting with people, picking up case work, converting stragglers.

I admire them for turning up in someone else's ward, honestly, we can all be blinkered about just looking after "our" bit of Liverpool. But it must have been a thankless task. Nice people some of them, as far as I can tell having served on a few committees and training courses with some of them. Just sadly misguided. My wave to you was genuine, if you were wondering by the way.

I digress, Doreen's promises from last year appear to be holding up without exception and several former LibDems are now moving across, Speke is going to be strongly Labour once again.

Garston is more interesting. We haven't done well there for a long time (last year things were starting to turn our way) but the years of neglect, delay and decay are starting to wear residents down.

In a spectacular own goal the LibDem candidate has put out a leaflet in Garston saying she has been helping the local urban village hall to get more funding from the (LibDem) council. I understand that the committee has written to local people in high dudgeon saying quite the opposite. They have never been approached, they are not getting the money etc etc.

Why do the LibDems insist on keep telling lies even when they know we are crawling over every utterance with a fine tooth comb.

Is it just arrogance?

Anwers on a post card please.

As an aside, I have just learnt that young Daniel Hughes who is a key player in Liverpool Garston Labour Party, (not the retiring Libdem councillor but sharing the same name by unhappy chance for both I suspect) has been appointed to a regional Labour Party campaign role. Lucky region, we will miss him, he is a very passionate and enthusiastic young man that has done a great service to the Labour Party in Liverpool. I hope his career within the party is as exciting and fulfilling as mine was.