Archives for May 2010

Just as the dust settles on one election, it's head first towards another. Labour wants a new leader and Ed Balls has been polishing up his Nottinghamshire roots.

His location to launch his leadership bid as the next Labour leader was an interesting one. The backdrop was a community centre in the Netherfield district of suburban Nottingham.

It's no stranger to the big political occasion. Gordon Brown has been there. And cabinet ministers have beaten a path to its smart and welcoming cafe. The St George's Centre is also the venue for the local Sure Start, which helps new mums and their kids. It was a purpose-built New Labour project.

For Ed Balls, the venue illustrated for him one of Labour's achievements in office. It also offered the right picture opportunities for the national and local media. Unlike his leadership rivals, this was no rushed photo-op outside the entrance of Westminster or the dingy surroundings of a think-tank conference.

The former Schools Secretary and right-hand man to Gordon Brown also celebrates his non-metropolitian upbringing: Norwich-born, educated at schools in Nottingham and now representing a constituency in West Yorkshire.

Netherfield is in the constituency of Labour's Vernon Coaker. He managed to hold onto his Gedling seat on an anti-Labour swing of less than 3%.

Elsewhere in the East Midlands, Labour lost 11 of its marginals with average swings of 7%. Altogether some 300,000 voters had switched their preference in this election from Labour to the David Cameron's Conservatives or the Lib Dems.

Ed Balls believes Gedling offers Labour some lessons: a local MP who is trusted, in contact with his community, communicates well and has an effective local party election machine.

A mug in hand, he has a blokeish charm and talks football - he supports Norwich City rather than Nottingham Forest.

He reminds me another "blokeish" politician with strong Nottinghamshire roots, who also aspired to lead his party: Rushcliffe's Ken Clarke. The Tories never quite trusted Ken on Europe. He's had virtually every top job government, except the one in Number 10.

Could the same fate await Ed Balls?

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Phew! The election negotiations are over. David Cameron and Nick Clegg are in Downing Street ...and some are already looking ahead to the campaign for the next general election.

Two senior local government Tories from the East Midlands now believe the Conservatives are at stage one. Stage two is about securing a majority Conservative government. But when and how soon?

David Parsons, the Leader of Leicestershire County Council, was at Westminster charting the impact of coalition government for local council spending. There could be more tough financial decisions in the months to come.

Kay Cutts, the Leader of Nottinghamshire County Council, knows the difficulties of managing and implementing a programme of efficiency savings, that critics and public sector unions will label as massive cuts.

Kay was at home watching the TV coverage of David Cameron arriving in Downing Street. She has doubts - shared by many Tories - about the coalition with the Lib Dems.

Many Tories are biting their lips over the prospect of a referendum on changing the voting system. The Alternative Vote is Stage One for the Lib Dems. Stage Two is full proportional representation.

It's easy to see why Tories in the East Midlands will be worried. According to research from the Electoral Reform Society, the Libs Dems would gain four seats off the Conservatives under AV (Alternative Vote), and nine seats under STV (Single Transferable Vote), the system most favoured by Nick Clegg's party.

Based on last Thursday's results, both types of voting systems would leave Labour still on 15 seats in the East Midlands. The Lib Dem gains would be at the expense of Conservative seats.

It's little wonder that senior Tories such as Kay Cutts and David Parsons want to secure a second Cameron government... with an outright majority.

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Is the political map of the East Midlands about to change? At the last election, Labour won 25 seats, the Conservatives held 18 and the Liberal Democrats secured just the one.

The region is getting two more seats anyway - Mid Derbyshire and South Northamptonshire - because of boundary changes. These constituencies are regarded as notional Conservative seats. That's because of past election results in the wards that make up these newcomers.

So what are the seats that'll be making headlines by Friday?

Here goes:

A 2% swing to the Conservatives would knock out Labour's Andy Reed in Loughborough and the Phil Hope, the government's Minister for the East Midlands in Corby.

Three per cent, and Labour lose Broxtowe and Derbyshire South. At 5%, Labour's casualty list includes Gedling, the Nottingham seat of schools' minister Vernon Coaker, Leicestershire North West and Lincoln, the power base of health minister Gillian Merron.

To get a Commons majority, David Cameron needs a swing of around 9% to take Derby North, suburban Erewash in Derbyshire and the semi-rural seats of Sherwood and Bassetlaw in Nottinghamshire.

And what of the Liberal Democrat surge? That could have its impact on both main parties in the East Midlands. A swing of 4.5% would take Leicester South from Labour's Sir Peter Soulsby. A similar swing from the Conservatives and the Lib Dems unseat Edward Garnier, the Shadow Attorney General, in Harborough.

No wonder this General Election has proved to be so fascinating.

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A senior Labour councillor from Leicester, who's hoping to become an MP, has defended his comments in which he described Gordon Brown as "the worst Prime Minister ever".

Manish Sood is a well known name in local Labour politics in Leicester. He's also Labour's parliamentary candidate for the Norfolk North West seat, and it's his strident criticism of Gordon Brown in a local newspaper in Norfolk that has sparked such a row.

In it, he says Gordon Brown is the worst Prime Minister ever and that Mr Brown owes the country an apology. Speaking from his Leicester home this morning, he stuck to his guns.

"Things are going totally wrong and it's a real disaster for the cities, the country and the nation. The average person has really got no respect for the Government," he said.

"All the policies he is bringing in are a total disaster. We need to rediscover the Labour Party of the past."

The Labour Party, in response, has dismissed his comments as the "bizarre ramblings of an eccentric".

His mother, Manjula Sood, is a former Lord Mayor of Leicester. She said she was "distraught" at the comments made by her son.

Someone else who knows Mr Sood well is Ross Willmott, the former leader of Leicester City Council. He's also a parliamentary candidate: contesting Leicestershire North West.

He told me Manish Sood 's remarks about Gordon Brown's leadership were mistaken.

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