A busy Saturday

Liam and I took one of Frank Doran's old surgeries on Saturday morning - just in case anyone was out there who did not know he was no longer their councillor but needed assistance anyway - and someone did turn up, so it was useful.

The three of us have had long talks about extending our surgery offerings, now that there are three of us, and have two or three new possible venues, now we have to negotiate them with the building managers in the different places. More on that later.

I then went down to Crewe with Claire and Tim Beaumont and we joined John Healey, Local Government Minister and a young man from Salford, out door-knocking. It was a fairly basic poll but I think I can safely confirm that the "outs" won, by a long head. The reaction in down-town Crewe was very positive, those who were actually at home, including one young woman who has never voted before. It was good to have John with us as he could engage people in the more lengthy conversations while we pressed on, persuading people with posters up to upgrade to our newer ones and chatted to more people. It was particularly good to turn a corner and meet Liverpool members Gerard and Miriam out delivering leaflets - Tamsin with Alex Ferguson, Tamsin with the regenerated Vera Duckworth for instance - on the other side of the street.

After Crewe I made it to Rosa's second birthday party - presents from the Farmer's Cart in York, a Farmer Ted DVD and a farming jigsaw. She is a lovely little girl and was beautifully dressed in a red gingham layered outfit, quite the belle of the ball.

Then I rushed off to the secret bunker in Fairfield to join Steve Faragher and Sheila Fazakerley from Kensington Vision in a podcast which you can download at
http://kvfm2008.mypodcast.com/index.html

They are doing great work to promote our neighbourhood and I really admire their work. Sheila made a great supper and we sat and chatted about the ways of the world and reminisced about our youthful ways, a smashing evening.

It was a lovely day all round.