The Final Countdown

Above is a video of John Biggs, London Assembly member for City & East acceptance speech. John was re-elected with an increased majority. He thanks East London for its support and promises to tackle the racist and fascist BNP.

The count at the Excel Centre of four London Assembly constituencies (City & East, Havering & Redbridge, Bexley & Bromley and Greenwich & Lewisham) started at 8am and went on until midnight. I left the count at about 9.30pm yesterday evening, just after the City & East declaration. Swift couple of pints with agent and activists then I took DLR home.

This (Saturday) morning: got up late, went for run, and came home out of condition and knackered. Put off cutting the hedge until tomorrow. Life goes on.

I’ll post on the overall Labour result when things calm down a little. I think it is helpful for people to remember it wasn’t all that long ago that Labour was in the lead and Gordon Brown walked on water.

I was a counting agent for Labour. Which meant checking that tellers and verification officers didn’t make any mistakes. The staff did an excellent job in very difficult circumstances. Many of the ballot papers were not filled out correctly and it was a long, long day. It seems to my surprise that there were more correctly filled out forms than last time.

Some highlights of a not particularly brilliant day was the ballot paper which was up for scrutiny because it had “P. Rick” written next to the name of the BNP Candidate, Richard Barnsbrook. Normally if there is a “signature” on a ballot paper it is not accepted because that could identify who the particular voter is. However, sensibly the officer accepted that this was not a signature and since there was a correctly filled out X on the ballot paper the vote was accepted (think about it).

Increase in the majority of the Labour Candidate for Greenwich & Lewisham Len Duvall (UNISON member and former NUPE Branch secretary).

The “Respect” Counting agent who tried to have “a pop” on how “bad” Labour was doing? People in glass houses....

Alex Heslop, UNISON member and Tower Hamlets Councillor who as the Labour candidate for Bexley & Bromley came 2nd when in 2004 Labour had been 4th.

The BNP counting agent who sat engrossed reading (I kid you not) a copy of “The Socialist Worker” left behind by the Left List agents. He failed to question or object to any decisions made about rejecting ballot papers which may have benefited the BNP. I didn’t see personally any BNP agents challenge any decisions. I think that they did not understand the process. What was the point of them being there?

The rumours (subsequently found to be true) that Labour had gained an Assembly seat from the Tories at Brent and Harrow. Also that Joanne McCarthy (good friend of London UNISON Labour link) was ahead at the Enfield & Haringey marginal (she won as well).

The low points are fairly obvious; the massive turnout in the Tory boroughs meant only one thing. The rumour that the BNP would get a seat (later proved true despite only increasing their vote by a lousily 0.16%).

Finally, a little light relief was from a suggestion from a long standing Labour Party member (who will remain forever anonymous) that if Ken loses he should be “parachuted in” by the Party to be the Labour Parliamentary candidate for Nantwich and Crew by-election. He thought that we should contact Labour HQ on this matter. This was of course a non-starter.... Ken would never leave his beloved London.