Looking back

So the election's all over. Well actually it's not at all - nobody won and everything remains very much up in the air. The people have spoken, and they said: "Meh."

In my constituency of Hornsey and Wood Green, the Lib Dem incumbent Lynne Featherstone was returned with an increased majority, beating off Karen Jennings of Labour, Richard Merrin of the Conservatives, Pete McAskie of the Green Party and independent candidates Rohen Kapur and Stephane de Roche.

Throughout the campaign I've been tracking all the campaign literature that has made its way to my doormat from these candidates, and assessing it in terms of positivity / negativity. I was pissed off by the bitchy, mud-slinging tone of some of the early mailings I received, and I wanted to take a proper look at how negatively the different candidates conducted their campaigns. There is, of course, an extent to which politics should be about highlighting the failures and mistakes of the other guy, but it's a question of how you strike the balance and whether your attacks have any substance.

What I received

Of the 31 items that made their way through my letterbox (that's a rough count - some may have gone astray and I can't quite remember which bits of paper arrived together or separately), the majority (19) were from the Lib Dems. About a quarter (8) were from Labour, and 10% (3) were from the Tories. I got one from Rohen Kapur and none from the Greens or from Stephane de Roche.

I had hoped there might be some striking correlation between the above figures and the share of vote received by the candidates, but I can't see one, except for the fact that they finished in that order (excluding the Greens and de Roche).

What I expected

My preconceptions were that Labour would be least negative because they're in government so they've got most to lose; followed by the Lib Dems because they already held the seat, and besides they seem kinda nice and sensible; and that the Tories would be the bitchiest, because they've got least to lose, and besides they're the nasty party.

What I got

Labour proved to be more bitchy than I'd expected. They took quite a few pops at the Lib Dems (some of which appeared to have been hastily concocted after Cleggmania took effect). I was particularly unimpressed by their use of an image of an axe to illustrate Lib Dem cuts. Really, no-one in this election has the right to get on a high horse about cuts. On the other hand, a lot of Labour's stuff was focused on bigging up their achievements, and as such was positive, although it tended to lack substance.

As for the Conservatives, my preconceptions turned out to be a little unfair. The first mailing I got from the Tory council candidates really got my back up with its ridiculous slurs against Labour councillors - in fact, that was what prompted me to start this blog - but the stuff I got from parliamentary candidate Richard Merrin steered mostly clear of mud-slinging. He set out his plans and he made a point of stating "positive reasons" to vote Tory - suggesting a conscious effort to avoid negativity. Of course, they didn't bother sending me much at all because they had so little chance of winning here, but what I got was mostly better than I'd expected.

Rohen Kapur was a protest candidate, so naturally he threw his arms up in the air in outrage at pretty much everybody else. Fair enough.

It was the Lib Dems I was most surprised by. Their campaign has made a lot of the idea of 'a new politics', giving an impression that the Lib Dems are somehow separate and distinct from the rest of the political world. It was this theme that brought Nick Clegg such success in that first TV debate: rolling his eyes at the other two leaders like they were his teenage sons. The message was: "We don't want any part of the Punch and Judy show that the big parties indulge in."

But on the evidence that my doormat and I saw, that just ain't true. It saddens me to say that the materials I received from the Lib Dems were frequently negative, and at times really quite low. It didn't have the vitriol of some of the stuff I got from the others, it was more a sense that they couldn't think of anything else to say. They demonstrated an obsession with two topics: the wickedness of Labour and tactical voting. They showed only a passing interest in Lib Dem policy.

For this reason I have been finding some of the commentary I've heard about the positivity and maturity of the Lib Dem campaign difficult to swallow. The 'new politics' message appealed to me but as the days went by I found it harder and harder to take seriously. Introducing PR would be a big step in the right direction, but for now it feels a long way off. I wonder if others felt this way too, and if that's why the dramatic surge in support failed to translate into votes. The more Clegg appeared in public, the more he looked and sounded like (gasp) a politician.

It should be pointed out, of course, that Lynne Featherstone won in my constituency with an impressive 3.7% swing in her direction giving her a majority of nearly 7,000. I shouldn't try to analyse the entire campaign, or even the entire local campaign, based on what landed on my doormat.

Election campaign mail, I realised quite quickly, is aimed at people of low intelligence. I felt that my intelligence was being insulted by much of what I received, in a way that I don't feel (to the same extent, at least) when I see a politician on the TV or read their blog or hear them speak. It's junk mail, and the only sensible thing to do is to chuck it away without reading it.

Whenever the next election comes around, that's definitely what I'll be doing.

Good morning!

It's election day! And before I headed down to the polling station to cast my vote this morning, I received two 'Good morning's, one from Labour and one from the Lib Dems. Richard Merrin, I can only assume, doesn't care what sort of a morning I have.

I do find it heartening when, on election day, candidates focus on just getting people out and voting. Labour have done the best job of this - all in their colours of course, but without too much brow-beating. The Lib Dems have taken the opportunity to remind us of what they've been telling us for weeks: that it's a straight choice between Lynne Featherstone and "Gordon Brown's [unnamed] Labour candidate", that Haringey Council is the worst in London and that the Tories can't win.

Verdict

From Labour, a good positive end to a mixed campaign. From the Lib Dems, a sad end to what I found to be a pretty sad campaign.

I'll sum up what I've seen over the past few weeks in full later.

This time we can do things differently

Really? Can we really do things differently this time? Let's see.

Nick Clegg says: "Don't let the old parties scare you with their negative attacks."

They're not, Nick. You are. You're all doing it, but at least the other parties aren't combining it with so much hypocritical rhetoric about a "new politics".

Verdict


I've seen worse in the past few weeks, but the Lib Dems capacity for slagging off negativity while indulging in it at the same time, has really surprised me in this campaign.

The latest Labour News

What looks at first glance like an admirable bit of positive campaigning from the beleaguered Labour Party turns out to be pretty bitchy. Side one: A nice photo of Karen Jennings and David Lammy at the Whittington with signs saying "Save A&E". Side two: a picture of an axe, symbolising Lib Dem cuts.

That's pretty low. Especially as any voter with a brain and a TV knows that there will be cuts whoever gets in.

Verdict

A whole page of nicey nicey positive Labour success story stuff is cancelled out by the bitchiness of the rest of this leaflet. I mean, an axe? Seriously? An axe?

Letter from Karen

Karen Jennings does a good job here of setting out some of Labour's supposed achievements and plans. But she's going for the old "you can only be sure with us" argument, which strikes me as a bit insulting. The letter concludes:

"I am asking you to think hard about whether your family and community can afford a Conservative government... The Liberal Democrats have said that they would give power to the Conservatives – a Lib Dem vote is a vote for Cameron."

Is that all you've got, Labour?

Verdict

Nice try, but it looks like Labour are falling back on fear and negativity in the final days...

Beneath the surface

Time now for some Labour bitching. This appears to have been knocked up at quite short notice in response to the unexpected rise in support for Nick Clegg and his Lib Dems - hence the rather cheap paper stock and poor printing.

This is so vicious and negative that it barely even mentions the party who sent it at all. Only the horror that will apparently ensue if I vote Lib Dem, and the terrible risk of some sort of Lib Dem-Tory alliance.

It's like they've been studying wartime propaganda – I half expect to see these leaflets being dropped from the sky by German planes. The only thing they haven't done is use some sort of 'horror' typeface with blood dripping off it, but they might as well have.

Verdict

I'm not the first person to use the word 'desperate' to describe the Labour party these days.

Letter from Lynne, aged 11 1/2

This may be the funniest item I've had so far. Lynne Featherstone, aged 11 1/2 (based on her handwriting) has sent me a cute little 'handwritten' (although obviously not actually handwritten) letter on small blue notepaper, like she's my pen pal who I met playing frisbee on a campsite in Cornwall.

It's not the first time I've had 'handwritten' post from Lynne, and it's not a tactic I feel I quite understand. Everyone knows it's not really handwritten. Everyone knows Lynne didn't actually deliver it herself. So what's the point?

It's a pretty bizarre affair. Her handwriting (if indeed it is hers) really is absolutely all over the place - she hasn't even put a piece of lined paper underneath to trace through. Schoolgirl error.

There's a bit of bitchiness here and some rather smug self congratulation, but for the most part Lynne is fairly positive.

Verdict

Not too bad. But next time Lynne, get someone to type it up for you.

When people voted Labour, they never thought it would be like this

The Lib Dems latest leaflet is another load of Labour-bashing. Overleaf they do make mention of the 'real change' that the Lib Dems are proposing to rectify all this mess, but on the whole it's negative.

Verdict

Boooo

Letter from Nick Clegg

I've barely been able to keep up with the 'literature' landing on my doormat in the last few days. I was away over the weekend, it's now the day before the election, and I've got a pile of six items to blog, and probably more when I get home this evening. So here we go: a letter from the man of the moment, Nick Clegg.

Basically it's a festival of Labour-bashing and tactical voting tips, with a brief coda about a party called the Lib Dems, who were previously unmentioned.

Verdict

So much for the new politics, eh Nick?

Feeling fed up?

Labour bad. Labour desperate. Labour no listen to clever Vince. Tories can't win.

That's the Lib Dem message as I've seen repeated about a squillion times now and it's starting to annoy me.

Verdict

The letter begins, "Feeling fed up?" Answer: Yes.

Lynne's record of action

After their last few bitchy mailings, the Lib Dems needed something a bit more positive. They seemed to have managed it with this letter and insert about Lynne's record of ACTION.

It's another example of the typographical inflation that I noticed earlier this week - at this rate they're going to have to start printing on A2.

But more to the point it does tell us some things about Lynne and the stuff she's done before it moves on to banging the tactical voting drum again.

It describes her more than once as "a saint", a quote from the Daily Telegraph which has been taken rather out of context. For the record she is not literally a saint, unless she has died and been canonised since her last Twitter update.

Verdict

Much better than their other recent stuff. Some actual reasons to vote. Hurrah!

It's time for change in Haringey

More post from the Tories (would've thunk) and this time they're declaring that "it's time for change in Haringey". This contrasts sharply with Lib Dem councillor Robert Gorrie's view, expressed in a letter I got from him this week, that "it's time for a change in Haringey".

The choice between Tory and Lib Dem apparently boils down to an indefinite article. Sigh.

Anyway, how bitchy are these mailings? Well the Tory one, like their last offering, is actually quite positive, listing lots of reasons to vote Conservative, only some of which involve the dastardliness of Labour.

The Lib Dem one disappointingly, kicks off with Labour-bashing, and finishes on tactical voting.

Verdict

Tories 1, Lib Dems 0 (Labour, prepare to be beaten up in the pub after the game).

Localness

Lynne Featherstone has been making quite a bit in her campaign of being a 'local girl' (check out this video). I wondered whether this was her taking a veiled pop at other candidates who aren't. So I asked Richard Merrin and Karen Jennings via Twitter how local they were, and whether it mattered.

Richard said:

"mother clinical nurse at whittington, family live in muswell hill but I am not making an issue of it"

and Karen said:

"I have lived in HWG for over a decade, imp to live in area but this election is about big issues jobs, economy, public services"

You heard it here first.

More from the Haringey Lib Dems

This one's about 50-50 Lynne-worship and Labour-bashing.

"Haringey officially worst council in London" the headline yells. Looks like they're getting frustrated at the limits of typography. It's bold and underlined, and I'm sure if their desktop publishing package had offered a 'flashing red' option, they'd have done that too.

Verdict

Not stellar.

Introducing Rohen Kapur

Until this week I'd only had election post from the three main parties, but they have now been joined by independent candidate Rohen Kapur.

Rohen's postcard says: "The three main parties want only three things: your vote, your TAX money and your unswerving obedience. Why not try real change instead?"

Since there wasn't room for much on his postcard I proceeded to Rohen's blog to find out a little more. Here's how he introduced his candidacy:

"I am not asking for your vote. I am here to give you a real choice. Let me make that very clear from the outset. The thought of being an MP scares the bejesus out of me but I am prepared to see the truth delivered on the television and radio and internet rather than the state sponsored lies, sponsored with your hard earned money. For that I am prepared to stand up and say I will help to bring that change about"

Not asking for my vote? Interesting campaign tactic. 

Verdict

So Rohen is a protest candidate. Which I suppose is, by definition, negative campaigning, except I forgive him, because he's only doing it to make a point, which, I have decided, makes it OK. And his blog is pretty funny too.

Dear oh dear oh dear

Dear oh dear oh double dear. The latest mailing from the Lib Dems is a fairly depressing read.

"Who is standing up for Hornsey and Wood Green?" it asks me in big letters. "Not Gordon Brown's Labour Party", it answers. Then there's a whole bunch of Labour-bashing, about how they backed Bush on the Iraq war (bang up-to-date, guys!) and how we shouldn't be "conned by desperate Labour".

Most of this nasty piece of campaign 'literature', though, is about tactical voting. The only reason that the Lib Dems seem to be able to come up with for voting Lib Dem is that... some other people are.

Verdict

Yes, you've had a surge in support. Yes, you might get some votes. But what have you got to say for yourselves? Full marks for elucidating what the other parties are up to, zero for telling us anything positive about yourselves. Boooo.

All about Richard

The Tories have hardly hassled me at all during this campaign (not like Lynne Featherstone, who sends me more post these days than all the local taxi and pizza firms put together).

But this week I received this confusingly folded (that's why some bits of it are upside down on the scan) leaflet from Richard Merrin, depicting him with an angelic glow. What's he got to say, then?

Firstly, I'm not sure his mantra of "Five more years of Gordon Brown or change with the Conservatives" really holds in this Lib/Lab marginal, but whatever.

I'm pleased to report that Richard has mostly got positive stuff to say, and he's devoted the whole back page of his little leaflet to "three positive reasons to vote for Richard Merrin". Good on you son.

There's a bit of Labour-bashing (they're "the party of unemployment", apparently - presumably not in their own words), but at least it's mostly in the context of saying what Merrin's been doing / plans to do about it.

Verdict

I have to say, I was expecting worse. Wonder how much more post the Tories will bother sending me.

Noel Park Labour News

I have got tons of new bumf to get through, from all three parties and an independent. Let's get going.

Firstly, God be praised, it's a miracle: from Labour, an entire double-sided A3 leaflet free of any negative campaigning at all. They've pointed to some real things they've done and not slagged anyone off in the process.

Verdict

Good show. For once.

More Labour News

As the incumbents on Haringey Council, Labour can't afford to be as negative as the other parties (who would they slag off?) And so it is that Labour News is quite a positive affair compared to most of what's landed on my doormat these past few weeks. The whole of the front page is about their "five key promises" from their manifesto, and a map showing off their achievements.

Overleaf, though, we have a large panel about the "savage" Lib Dems (that's right - it literally calls them savage). The new nasty party, apparently.

"Their leader has made a promise of 'savage cuts' and now they have even refused to rule out cuts to the NHS - not even the Tories go that far."

What follows are some predictable misrepresentations of fact by people who should know better. They've used the fact that the Lib Dems want to "review the use of CCTV" (gasp) as evidence of them being "soft on crime". Please.

I'd be interested to know how quick these printed mailings are turned around, and whether they're able to respond to unexpected events like... ooh... Nick Clegg winning the leaders' debate. In this case though I think the viciousness is just a function of Hornsey & Wood Green being a close-run Lib v Lab seat.

Verdict

One of the starkest contrasts so far between positive elucidation of policy and vicious negativity against the other parties. What a shame.

Real change for Britain?

The Lib Dems' latest mailing, titled REAL CHANGE FOR BRITAIN divides the positive and the negative nice and neatly. On one side of the A4 sheet  is devoted entirely to the awfulness of Britain under New Labour. They maek the place sound almost as bad as the Americans did during their daft healthcare 'debate'.

On the other side, we get some homely pictures of Nick and Vince ,including one of Nick with a pensioner (which is second only to a baby on the list of desirable photoshoot companions).

They set out some not-very-detailed ideas about cutting "waste and red tape" and "cleaning up politics", with each point introduced by a sentence in bold slagging off Labour.

Verdict

There are about eight words of substance in this leaflet. They are: "give people the power to sack corrupt MPs". The rest is mostly negative and a waste of time.

Are we negative voters?

In what became a rather shouty interview on the Today programme this morning, the Lib Dems' home affairs spokesman Chris Huhne said Nick Clegg's surge in support this week is partly a result of the negative way people have typically chosen how to vote:

"For many years now we've had indications in the polls that the support for Labour and the Conservatives is much more fragmented, much more negative, for example, nearly half of Conservative supporters don't actually like the Conservatives, they simply vote Conservative to keep Labour out, and similarly a very substantial proportion of Labour people vote Labour to keep the Tories out." 

Mark Steel made a similar point in yesterday's Independent:

"For several years, and especially since the Iraq war, many Labour voters haven't really voted for 'Labour' but for 'Oh blimey, pwww, Labour I suppose'."

So do we get the campaigning we deserve? I'm not so sure. Politicians have a chance to set the tone by offering something to believe in, and for the most part in recent times, they've failed.

Time for a clean up?

I'm surprised there hasn't been more focus on the expenses scandal in the bumf I've received so far this electiontide. This weekend I got quite a fancy leaflet from the Lib Dems (fancy in that in folds in an interesting, concertina sort of a way) titled 'Time for a clean up?'

It lists some headlines about how naughty Labour and the Tories were in the expenses scandal (I'd like to check the details of the news stories for veracity but time doesn't permit), and goes on to say that when the Lib Dems put forward plans to clean up Westmister, "Labour and Conservative MPS voted them down".

"We deserve much better than this," they say.

Verdict

I'm going to let the Lib Dems have this one. Yes, it's the same old same old playground politics, but I think they earned themselves a bit of smugness in the expenses scandal and they're spending it now. However I fear that we may all realise soon that comparing an opposition party with the government is a bit like comparing your to-do list from this morning with a list of things you actually did today.

Is proportional representation the cure for negative campaigning?

Is proportional representation the cure for negative campaigning? I'm looking at all the campaign nonsense I've received, and much of the negativity surrounds tactical voting  - which wouldn't be such an issue if we had a PR system. Lib Dem candidate Lynne Featherstone is saying the Tories can't win in Hornsey & Wood Green, while Tory candidate Richard Merrin tweets from a nearby council ward that the "vote yellow get Brown" message is sinking in.

I was quite shocked recently when I checked out voterpower.org.uk, which does some maths to show you what your vote is (or isn't) worth based on how marginal your home constituency is. Not that I didn't know how the system works, but it hadn't occurred to me before just how massively undemocratic it is.

Would PR make our politicians grow up and have sensible conversations with us and with each other?

More pseudo-news

It bodes well for news journalism that politicians are so keen to ape it at election time. My latest bit of 'literature' from the Lib Dems is the Hornsey & Wood Green Focus, a journal of whose existence I was not hitherto aware.

It's a mixed bag. the bulk of it is about the same 'pledges' that they wrote to me about the other day, with hardly a hint of bitching or eye-scratching against the nasty reds and blues.

Overleaf it's a bit of a different story, with an 'article' (is that the right word?) titled  "Local Tories must come clean on climate change denial" and another one about Labour apparently "admitting" that there's no case for closing the Whittington Hospital's A&E department. Yawn.

Verdict


Descends into negativity like almost everything else I've received, but at least Lynne gets some proper arguments across in the process.

Another letter from Lynne

These days if I get home from work and haven't got a letter from a PPC, I feel neglected.

It's mostly the incumbent Lib Dems bothering me this week.

Another letter from Lynne today, with a usual bit of Labour-bashing in the context of the tactical voting by which the Lib Dems are so preoccupied. It's accompanied by another flier telling me there's no use voting Tory, which again mixes up the figures for parliamentary and council elections rather confusingly (and pointlessly). One set of numbers at a time please, guys.

Verdict

In a single sentence, it's "Labour are bastards... but I'm great!" Nothing new here, then.

Lib Dem pledges

My latest bit of post from the Lib Dems is this letter asking which of their pledges "matter most" to me.

It kicks off with some typical Labour-bashing but goes on to set out some policies. Well done.

Overleaf it lists six 'pledges' and asks me to number them in order of preference, presumably so they can send me more bumf in a few weeks time on the topic of my choosing.

It's pretty light stuff, and a lot of it mentions or implies the wickedness of Labour, but they are making an attempt to say what they're gonna do.

Just as things were going so well, I glance at the flier that accompanies the letter, bearing the slogan "Don't be conned by desperate Labour!" in big friendly letters. "Labour have little positive to say about their own record," it hilariously claims. Nick Clegg, on the other hand, does have something positive to say... in a smaller box on the right. Tsk.

Verdict

Positive substance balanced by bitchiness. However, it's much less dull than the Labour literature I got last week, which was full of the kind of pointless claims (better policing, fairer society, more funding for schools) that only the likes Hitler and Ming the Merciless could possibly disagree with.

Lynne vs Gordon

I get more post from Lynne Featherstone these days than I do from my mum. Three items in the first half of this week from the Lib Dems. So what do they have to say for themselves?

Firstly there's this big shiny leaflet asking who will deliver FOR ME as my next MP. Lynne Featherstone is "the positive choice", they claim. How positive, though?

To answer that question they've provided a handy checklist showing how Lynne weighs up against "Gordon Brown's Labour candidate" (that's Karen Jennings to you and me). This is rather unfair, especially with the picture of a tired, sad-looking GB (not that he ever really looks otherwise). However it can only reflect well on Karen that the Lib Dems have shied away from going head-to-head against her. Par for the course so far.

Overleaf we hear "what local people say about Lynne Featherstone. Turns out they like her, and for three out of five of them it's for positive reasons, and not just because she's not a Tory.

We then get to hear about how she's battled to get Hornsey Hospital reopened, to keep police stations open longer and to hold people to account for the whole Baby P mess.

Verdict

It's a bit rich calling oneself "the positive choice" without naming the opposing candidate. Instead the Lib Dems have fallen back on Brown-bashing. Still, they have backed it up with some positive stuff about Lynne, so we'll let them get away with it this time.

All about Karen

After getting to the end of Labour News, I was running low on patience with Karen Jennings and Labour, but the second item I've received from them is less irritating.

This one focuses on Karen herself, and, would you believe it, the content is mainly positive. Dull, yes, but positive.

She kicks off talking about Labour's handling of the recession, about how she's supported "job-boosting measures and extra help for families, businesses and home owners". It's all very vague, of course, and she's appealing to people's trust in Labour as competent administrators rather than people who might have any kind of vision or principles. But she doesn't get bogged down in taking pops at The Other Guy, which is what I'm judging her on.

The next page, headlined "My priorities for Hornsey", puts her in the lead so far. My doormat and I currently don't know what the other parties' priorities for Hornsey are because they haven't got round to telling us. Again, it's very vague, but at least Karen's trying. She tries to pin it down using the word  "guarantees" four times (of jobs for the young, police response times, education standards and NHS treatment standards), although to me this sounds like the centralised targets that New Labour have become so notorious for.

Then she lists "local achievements", and again it's positive in an innocuous sort of a way - campaigning for education funding, supporting voluntary organisations, yadda yadda. The only example that could really be described as taking a stand is that she opposed lap-dancing clubs in Woodside and Crouch End. There - now we know something about her.

Verdict

Well done Karen, you barely mentioned the other guys once. But next time let's have more specifics.