The Advertiser has this piece about the possible leadership challenges in the Tory group, which quotes Geoff Roberts (possibly, still their leader) as saying:

“I’m a little concerned at the somewhat radical view of the younger members because that is not the Conservative Party. That happened under Margaret Thatcher and we ultimately paid the price.

Interesting that their own leader is tarring them with the Thatcher brush.

The Labour councillors see the extreme right-wing views of the local Tories week in and week out, but it generally doesn’t surface in public. Perhaps, with new leadership and a new direction it’ll become clear. These guys are not the cuddly, tree-hugging kind that the national party would like to promote – and nor is Cameron, for that matter.

I’m bound to get some criticism for this, but I’ve just been watching Blair’s message to Sarkozy on YouTube. It’s neat. The whole Downing Street channel is a good idea.

Yeah yeah, this technology and YouTube have been around for ages, and yes, Cameron has been doing it for ever and, yawn, the Labour Party has their own channel too. That’s not the point. The Cameron and Labour channels are purely political and are therefore dull, clunky and don’t engage.

The Downing Street channel, being launched just as Blair leaves, is a chance to try a different way of engaging with the electorate. Am I pleased that a Labour Prime Minister is congratulating a French right-wing President? No, not really, but Blair long ago gave up doing the party politically correct thing. However, I am pleased that they’re finally using sites like YouTube at a level which is slightly above the usual brick-throwing political stuff which turns people off.

It’s possible that no-one will actually watch it, but it’s a start.

(perhaps I need a John McDonnell clip to balance things up! I’ll look for an appropriate one here!)

I’ve added Rosie Cooper’s website to the blogroll on the right. I realised that I’d only mentioned District Councillors, and Rosie and the County Councillors deserve a mention. If there are any other west lancashire politics related websites I’ll happily namecheck them here – so long as they’re not bashing Labour (too much!)

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Updated: 7/5/07:

County councillor sites:

• Bob Pendleton
• Chris Cheetham
• Terry Aldridge
• Francis Williams

Added to the blogroll.

Derby Councillor, Adrian Owens, has been dipping a toe into the online world. His website has all sorts of fascinating facts and press releases about what he’s been up to.

Nothing much there about the council which he is a leading figure on. Instead it’s all directed at the County Council and the Government. Something tells me that his sights locally are set higher than just being the leader of West Lancs District Council.

It’s really just a collection of press releases, but that’s ok – at least he’s posting them on the web. To my knowledge that brings the count to three councillors with personal websites: myself, Paul Cotterill (an online version of the Bickerstaffe Record) and Adrian Owens.

What with these, and the Advertiser’s successful “Battle for West Lancashire” blog, we could be starting to see the evolution of a genuine online political space in West Lancs.

Adrian should have the courage of his convictions and change his site from a noticeboard of press releases to a more open blog style. Of course, openness and Tories tend not to go hand in hand in West Lancs.

The results from Thursday’s election suggest that Labour, locally, hasn’t moved in the past twelve months. One good councillor, with a strong personal vote (in Wrightington) stood down, and we gained another good councillor with a strong personal vote in Bickerstaffe.

To move forward in West Lancs, we need to see a bigger swing than 0.38%. Given that Skelmersdale North was a 30% swing back to Labour (from an independent) that wipes out that tiny increase.

It took a long time for the local party to get over losing control in 2002. Indeed, I think that some haven’t still got over it, and we’re still struggling with that.

I believe that it is for the Labour group to vocalise the dissatisfaction across West Lancs about how the Tories are running the Council. Their incompetence implementing changes to the recycling. Their Aughton-centric view of the world, and their arrogant assumption that what they do is “excellent”.

Labour in West Lancs has to reach out: be a voice, and fight for those who are let down by this council; for all those who deserve better.

Tories in West Lancs will be delighted with the result from last Thursday. Immediately after the election (about 3am on Friday morning), I wrote that we hadn’t reached rock bottom. In a more optimistic view after a couple of sleeps, I’m hoping that we hit it last year – and that this year just represents us bumping along the bottom.

Things should start to improve for Labour, but it will requre a positive shift in how the Labour group is perceived, or for people to realise the arrogance and increasing nastiness of the governing Tory council. Or perhaps both.

Personally, I think that only a Labour controlled council will deliver for all residents of West Lancs. I will do what I can within the group to build a strong effective team, and will continue to work hard in Moorside ward.

If we continue as we have over the past year, things could get worse. We could lose seats in Up Holland, and perhaps in Skelmersdale. However, I am certain that Maggie Skilling is a well known, well liked councillor in Up Holland and we won’t have the same problems that we had this year. Cynthia Dereli is a brilliant councillor in Burscough, and I’m sure that the people in her ward recognise that.

I am, generally, optimistic. Labour has the more positive view of West Lancs and what it can be. Cameron’s Tories prefer to keep us in the dark, providing second rate services and refusing to allow scrutiny. It is for our local Labour leaders to step up and take on the local Conservatives and I hope that it will happen over the next twelve months. Otherwise, we’re in opposition until at least 2012.

Just got back from the count – not a great night for Labour in West Lancs. I overhead someone say that we’d “turned the corner” which, with a net loss of one seat, is perhaps over-egging the result a bit.

Paul Cotterill did brilliantly in Bickerstaffe and showed how hard work over a long period of time can win seats. More disappointing to lose Scott and Wrightington. Particularly since the Scott loss means that we don’t have any more councillors in Ormskirk any more.

Over the whole district, I calculate that there has been a marginal (0.38%) swing to Labour. However, it’s not large enough to win seats. In fact ignoring the large swing in Skelmersdale North (a swing from Ind to Lab after Joan Morrison didn’t stand0), the two largest swings for Labour in the district were in Bickerstaffe and Knowsley (7.19% and 7.77% respectively).

We’ve not yet hit rock bottom – we held on to Up Holland and we now have two councillors outside of Skelmersdale / Up Holland, but there is a lot of work to be done for people to accept us as an acceptable opposition, and possible future controlling group. That seems a long way off tonight. Anyone who says the way back is easy, or that we’ve even turned the corner, needs a reality check.

Speculation around that there might be an upset in Scarisbrick. I’m willing to bet that we won’t see any surprises there – I expect the Conservative candidate to win there by a healthy majority.

Some have cited the Skelmersdale North election a couple of years ago when an independent stood against the, then Labour group leader, Alan Bullen. There was very nearly a shock that year with the independent coming close to beating the incumbent.

However, back then there was a strong independent campaign with many “pseudo-anonymous” leaflets going out. These attacked our candidate but didn’t go so far as to suggest voting for anyone else. The imprint cryptically had the Conservative’s HQ address, but nothing else. In the eyes of election law, they could get away with it because it didn’t explicitly suggest voting for someone, just not to vote Labour. In fact, at the time I called the Conservative agent to double check that they had put the leaflet out, which he confirmed.

After the count, the Tories went all coy and said that they should have withdrawn their candidate, as if that were the only way to help someone. The reality is that the Tories were in there and fighting hard for the independent.

The situation in Scarisbrick is much less clear, and the impact of an upset far less than Skem North would have been in 2004. We’ve seen already that Mrs Edwards will vote with the Conservatives as an independent – she did it on a number of occasions at the last full council. There is virtually no way that Labour can “come through the middle”, since we only get around 200 votes, while the Conservatives last polled around 800. We would have to more than double our vote and the Tories would have to split equally between the candidates.

It just won’t happen. I expect that Scarisbrick will be a damp squib tomorrow night. Another new face on the Tory benches, and if the trend from the last couple of years continues, a further lurch to the right.

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Updated 7th May: As I suggested above, there was no great surprise in Scarisbrick. Mrs Edwards came a respectable 2nd place with 292 votes behind the Tory with 614 and (relatively) just ahead of the Labour paper candidate with 158. From the reaction at the count, it’s fair to say that the Tories had no idea how things would go. There was a massive crowd around the table and many worried faces (very briefly).

David Sudworth, from the Addy, will be live blogging at the local election count tomorrow night. Should make interesting reading. We’ll all be there checking the counts are running correctly, and listening in to the results from around the country. It’ll make a change to catch up on the local newspaper’s viewpoint as it happens.

Shame that our very own podcasting Chief Exec can’t give a similar running commentary, but he’ll be overseeing the count as the returning officer. I’m not going to even _try_ to post anything here tomorrow night, since I’ll have plenty to do until the last result is known.

Some nuggets of info picked up over the past couple of days which could make the next few weeks very interesting.

Firstly, it looks like the extraordinary meeting of the council which was first scheduled for the 24th has been put back to the 31st. Not sure why yet, but I’m hearing that the meeting is regarding the senior officers remuneration – basically how much the cheif officers are paid. A review has been ticking away in the background for a couple of months now, but it is a surprise to see that they’re suddenly calling a special council meeting.

It looks like the Conservatives see that this is politically embarrassing, and want to get it out of the way as quickly as possible after the elections. I would be interesting to see how much a full council meeting actually costs in terms of officer time, getting the council opened, getting the agendas out, etc.

The other nugget is that I am told that there are moves afoot to change the council leadership. No doubt there will be some spin on this from the Council itself – but I’m hearing that there are moves afoot to oust the current leader after the election, and that it is the younger right-wing, councillors who want to take over.

Interesting times indeed…

Nice to see this article in the “Battle for West Lancashire” blog about the Up Holland Parish Council meeting last Tuesday: Parish Power (The Battle for West Lancashire).

The evening was a lovely occasion and celebrated Arthur Tennant’s very many contributions to life in Up Holland. Arthur was one of the first people Jude and I got to know in the village and he was extremely welcoming.

I hope that in the future, the parish will be able to honour other people in the village in the same way that they have Arthur. If Parish Councils are to succeed, they should be at the heart of the community – dealing with both the mundane and joyful things in the community. They should be leading the celebration when people like Arthur are being recognised, but also sharing in the success of individuals across the villages and towns. I’m sure that, in that way, they would gain a lot more respect and recognition in themselves for being an active part of the community.

It also touches on the proposals for the Skelmersdale and Ormskirk Town Councils. The main arguments in favour have been that people should have a greater say in what goes on locally. Having been a parish councillor once, I don’t think they would have the power that they think they would have, but if they avoid irrelevance and are seen to be at the centre of the community, then there is a chance that they will build more influence and good will than any government bill could provide.