Tag: Melksham & Devizes

Here comes another slice of tree through my letterbox, I receive two or three per day, all from the Conservatives; I love the overkill of desperation in the morning! This time, apparently, Keir Starmer wants me to vote Lib Dem, yesterday it he wanted me to vote Reform; just what does Keir Starmer want me to do?!

The answer to this cannot be found on a publicity pamphlet from his opposition, and the audacity of the author of it to assume we’re foolish enough to think that it could is an insult to our intelligence, and one damn good reason not to vote Conservative, amidst a kazillion others. No, I’m having a cuppa again, this time with our Labour candidate Kerry Postlewhite.

It was the chat I was most anxious about, as my belief as working class the Labour Party is the party for me, seems contradictory to modern assumption which sees our poorest voting blue, ignorant to how they’re shafting them, and this postulation there’s turmoil in Labour dividing them between the leftwing opinion of Corbyn and the middle-ground of Starmer. I questioned Kerry of the latter, but she denied such matter, assuring me, “I’m not sure the Labour Party is divided. I think it’s quite clear we’re all united behind Keir Starmer, our shadow cabinet and our programme for government. I’ve been a member of the Labour Party for a long time, and I think the sense of unity and the sense of purpose is strong this time because we know what the last fourteen years has meant to ordinary families, to working families, and it is our duty to unite. It isn’t about leaning into the left or right, it’s about leaning into where the British people are and the change they need right now. And I think that’s exactly where we are now.”

Oh dear, have even I succumbed to the propaganda machine of Tory cronies?!

“I think the results that two general elections showed you, that the programme the Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn was offering to ordinary working people then was not the programme they were prepared to support.” I supposed she was right, even if I thought he was fab and groovy!!

You should note this interview took place before the hustings in Devizes, where the mighty clashed, and Noel’s camcorder flashed! Whilst I salute Noel and the organisers, I favour to chat, and get to know them on an individual basis, therefore while these transcripts are lengthy, they’re insightful and worth persevering with should you wish to really get an in-depth angle on who you’re voting for. And there’s the thing, Kerry instantly quashed my anxiety, and her charismatic persona made me feel I was gassing with an old friend.

We spoke casually for longer than the others because Kerry had ordered food to fuel her busy day on the campaign trail, and I waited for her to finish. She had sat downstairs for this, though I requested we move upstairs where it is quieter. Assisting her with her coat and clipboard broke the ice and stood us on an even level I only teetered on with Brian. Though he was professional till the end, and magnified the perfect host with interesting anecdotes, Kerry would do similar once we got down to business, such was skill in her demeanour to switch between expertise and friendliness. Clearly, Labour have not just posted any ol’ oddball into the job, to fill a lost cause in this historically Tory haven, and Labour is far from a helpless wounded animal as the opposition may have you believe.

It was something in informal chatting afterwards which really won it for me, wondering why Kerry didn’t bring this up before. We were dismissing this delusional, tarnishing with the same brush idea Gen Z were demonic hooligans, and I mentioned my view on lowering the voting age. Kerry delighted by informing me it was in Labour’s manifesto to lower it to sixteen. While it matters nothing to me personally, being in my fifties, I’m not such a grumpy old fart to be ignorant giving youth a say on how the country is managed is far fairer than not and sending them off for slave labour camouflaged as National Service. 

In our chat with Brian last Tuesday, I said if he could win this it would be as historical as the Battle of Roundway, being the last time the Conservatives lost this seat was to a Liberal in 1923, but if Kerry wins, it would be greater in significance, being no Labour candidate has ever won here.  I asked Kerry how she felt about the possibility, giving her multiple choices of extreme optimism, excitement, dread, or something else!

“I guess a mixture,” Kerry said. “How amazing would it be. It’s a new constituency, so it’s an opportunity for a fresh start and a new Member of Parliament. It will be an uphill fight, but we’ve been out, talking to people, and one of the things we are hearing repeatedly is people who have always voted Conservative and never done anything else here are not prepared to do it again because of everything that’s happened over the last fourteen years, the last five years in particular, I think.”

“So it’s up to us, I guess, to convince them they can place their trust in the Labour Party for the first time in this area, and that we are offering change in a way that is meaningful to them and their lives and their families, and it will be different from everything they’re now turning their backs on, so that is exciting. It’s also quite humbling, because we’re not in a situation where we’re able to take anything for granted. We do have to go out and really win those votes.”

“There was a report published yesterday, I think, which we’re talking about on the radio this morning, about general mistrust in politics. I think this is a real opportunity to win back that trust. It’s going to be a slow process, and people are going to have to see you walk the walk, not just talking the talk. And I think for me, a lot of it is genuinely listening to people and not making assumptions that everybody who lives in the Melksham and Devizes constituency is a Conservative, or thinks in one way, or votes in one way; genuinely listening to them, meeting them where they are and hearing their stories and experiences, and connecting those to politics, policies and the way forward.”

Kerry talked on a different approach to the current, thankfully, comparable to her ten years in the European Parliament, “where people with different political parties and political families, different beliefs must work together to make the best law; there isn’t an inbuilt majority, that’s the nature of the beast. You must find common ground and you have to work together to find the best solution, because it is divided by countries, languages and all sorts of different interests. I think that’s even more important here, in an area that traditionally has supported one party. It’s not about saying you’re different. We’re different. It’s about saying we find common ground and do politics differently.”

Modernising Westminster, “maturing it in a progressive way,” Kerry continued onto, transforming the House of Lords, ridding it of “archaic barriers, that literally put people on one side of the room and on the other side of the room, and chat to each other. I don’t think that’s how people want politics done. I think they want it done in a grownup mature and cooperative way; the way that we solve problems at work or in life, you know?”

“We work together to find solutions and I find that an exciting way of doing things. I’m excited by this, which isn’t a manifesto, this is my personal view. I’m really excited by some of the experiments which have happened with citizens assemblies, so bringing representative groups of people together in communities to find solutions to local problems and talk them out. How are we going to further the agricultural industry in our area, for example, how are we going to make sure this housing development works for us, the community, how are we going to mitigate climate change, and doing such together with representatives of the people is what excites me; a new way, I think, that fits in the never having had a Labour MP here. It’s how we could be in different scenarios, so let’s use that different scenario to do our politics differently.”

See? I like Kerry, surely even the most traditional locals cannot deny we’re overdue a change. I asked Kerry how she felt about the Devizes-Melksham Primary, and the strategically voting ideal they promote.

“I think maybe let’s separate the two things. The idea of the Devizes-Melksham Primary, I would always welcome active citizens who want to organise themselves, who want to get involved in local democracy and have a say over local democracy, that’s fantastic. We need more active citizens. So the concept of having an organisation like the Primary I think  is laudable. When it comes to strategically voting or tactically voting, I think people must vote in the way that they think is right for them, for their families and for their communities, and that should be the deciding factor.”

“Personally, I think there’s a strong case for looking at our electoral system, so people don’t have to make those decisions about what to do, So that every individual’s vote counts whatever the electoral geography. Because everything that has happened over the last fourteen years, because of the situation that this country is now in where nothing works, literally everything is broken and we have volunteers and communities like this one holding vital services together means it is a once in a generational election, and when it is a once in a generation election, you do have to vote with your head and your heart and put your cross in the box for the person and the party that you think is going to represent you best at Westminster. And play a part in shaping laws so that they work for small towns and rural communities and people here have a have a voice in shaping those laws, and, I think, that’s another reason why Westminster needs modernising. One of the things that I do professionally is work to influence laws, most recently in animal welfare, and it’s an arcane process at Westminster. It’s not transparent.”

I likened it to the bickering brawl of a school playground. Kerry referred to the pros and cons of having “the mother of all Parliaments,” and told me how she volunteered in Zambia for several years, comparing their government to ours for being stuck in the past,  exampling “the adversarial set of the building to the chanting at prime ministers questions, to the way in which bill committees work, for example, where only a number of amendments are accepted by the speaker, the committee reflects the proportions of Parliament and it’s therefore the Minister and the bill committee and the Government of the day that decides whether an amendment is accepted or not, goes through or not, to trooping through two lobbies to decide how you vote. I think there are a lot of things that could be done to modernise Parliament to make it more accessible to the electorate, to make it more transparent and more accountable and more fit for purpose.”

Never say never was the approach of the last Labour candidate Rachel’s hopes of winning here, and Kerry agreed.  “I think the thing that really stands out in in this election in this area, is we put our faith and we have always put our faith and our families have always put their faith in the Conservative Party but that has been abused, and we cannot, and will not do that again. I think I must demonstrate that the Labour Party will deliver for areas like this one and deserve those votes. One of the problems with strategic tactical voting issue is that, for me, it almost becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. So if people do that one time, they do it the next time, the next time, and they never then have the opportunity to allow themselves to change and vote for the other.”

Kerry was born in the North-East of England and moved to Trowbridge at primary school age. She studied in Yorkshire after living just over the border in Somerset , took a job in local government in London and worked in education. She moved to Brussels to work in the European Parliament, then went over to Zambia to volunteer with an NGO, coming back again to Radstock for family needs Kerry and her partner now live near  Ross-on-Wye but she has many family connections here. She talked about one of her earliest smelly memories of the Harris Bacon factory in Calne when she spent summer holidays with family there! I ask this question to all because Danny Kruger being hoisted in for the Conservatives never bode well with locals, and him never relocating here doubled it. I think people like to know the MP has local connections, and Kerry said that if she won the seat she would of course move here. But what of local policies? The health centre cropped up again.

Just as with Catherine and Brian, the failing of local health infrastructure, the closing of the hospital in Devizes, and improving the lack of facilities at the new health centre was high on their election pledges. “There did used to be A&E, and beds for the elderly, but all of that has now gone; you must make a journey to Chippenham, Swindon, or Bath and the time that takes, a difficult bus journey, particularly for older people and the cost too. The fact that if you are then hospitalised, you are a long way away from family and friends. So I think that would have to be a huge priority for me. And I’m quite excited by the fact the Labour Shadow Health Secretary was talking about community-based healthcare, be that physical health or mental healthcare, and I think this is a huge priority for this community, to make sure we have this kind of provision, that it’s more accessible, particularly for the elderly.”

Prime time to play devil’s advocate in line with the common criticisms of Labour, how do we how do we fund more money for the NHS? “The Labour Party has been clear that there are no plans to raise taxes for working people and that the money will be found in a range of ways. For our immediate priorities of cutting waiting lists, doubling cancer scanners, a dentistry recovery plan and the return of the family doctor we’re going to make sure that those with the broadest shoulders, non-doms for example, pay. We are going to stabilise and grow the economy to invest in public services.  So, for example, for Great British Energy, we will put in place a windfall tax on fossil fuel companies who’ve been looking at huge profits whilst our bills have been skyrocketing over the past years, so we can get clean power and lower bills. One of the things we’ve been clear about is that we’re talking about a decade of national renewal; none of these problems are going to be solved overnight because of the situation we’re inheriting, which economically is not great.”

 And education, I asked, which is where our chat will end, but progressed unofficially onto this voting age reduction I mentioned at the start. I put it to Kerry that the education system in the same place as the NHS, it needs an overview, a review.

“I think we need to do both, so we need to make sure that we’re retaining the teachers that we have, but one of the things that we have committed to in our first six steps is to introduce 6,500 new teachers, particularly in those subjects that currently are seeing insufficient numbers of teachers in those STEM subjects, for example, and hopefully the recruitment of those new teachers will help to support those existing teachers who currently are being spread too thinly. I think the other thing that is exciting is our commitment to broaden education the curriculum, so it’s fit for the 21st century, looking at some of those modern skills children need. Look also at the cultural industries, so the cultural industries are a major engine of economic growth in the UK, our curriculum needs to reflect those things.”

My annoyance flared with the current conservative system whereby schools are being run like businesses and I welcomed such a consultation, hoping to unify and implement a national system of equality in schools. But in this, a change in our methods in general, with Labour, will we be moving away from privatisation?

“We have committed to a new rail system, so when current franchises expire or if the companies are in breach of contract, we have said that they will now come into a new arm’s length public national rail body that will run our rail services in a way that works for passengers and taxpayers

I didn’t want to talk about poo in our rivers, fun as it might be, people were eating their lunch, but while it may be scatological subject of mirth, it’s also a nail in the coffin for Tories. Does this include water companies as well?

“So for water companies,” Kerry expressed, “it’s an outrage that they have been able to dump sewage in our waterways and jeopardise health and environment. The figures here are appalling. Under Labour, the situation will be, not paying bonuses to chiefs of water companies where it’s been shown that they have broken their terms and there is pollution going into our waterways. We will also strengthen the regulator and give it real teeth to fight back, on behalf of the public to make sure we clean up our rivers and our waterways.”

Kerry’s answers were defined by professionalism despite her capability of making you feel she was honest, earnest and pleasant. This doesn’t help my dilemma of where to put my cross, being Brian and Catherine I also liked. But one thing I’m certain of, a vote for either one of these candidates is a vote well spent. As for the strategic vote against the voting with your heart debate, I think it’s not so important now, because whichever way you decide, in either of these three candidates we will have a fine MP prepared to embrace honest and necessary change.

I thank Kerry for her valuable time to chat with me and wish her all the best in what could be an exciting, interesting and historic election, especially locally.

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