The end game

At last the end game approaches.

It’s the part where I’ve no control over what happens – it’s where the voters take over. Hopefully they will vote - and make the right choice. Someone sent me a copy of the Times front page cartoon: Tory HQ, “Voter apathy is our only hope”. I replied that at least that was a strategy. But it’s not one we’re employing here; I hope there is a decent turnout despite the general air of fed-up-ness seen on the doorstep.

And of course although I’m fixated on Thursday 2 May, and have been for some time, to most people it’s just a date. I spoke to a couple of people at the harbour today who hadn’t realised polling day was on Thursday. But they are the ones with a life, not me.

So what am I doing in the lead up to polling day? Delivering my second leaflet to the few streets I haven’t been to yet and admiring my posters that have been put up in various strategic places.

Feedback from the last couple of days of door knocking has been mixed.

Having identified the key signal for a holiday let in Beadnell (a model boat in the window), I realise that in Seahouses it signifies people who were involved in the fishing industry. That is useful to know. Someone in Bamburgh spotted (the first one) that my photo on the front of the leaflet was taken more than a year ago (although to be fair it wasn’t too far ago). That wasn’t very helpful. More seriously, I heard a strong plea against the reduction in housing subsidy (I said that although there may be individual problems as a long term decision it had to be right). I heard concerns about over development in Seahouses and about potholes. And I heard a couple of complaints that there had been too many leaflets in this campaign: “you lot only visit at election time” said someone before saying they weren’t going to vote. Well, yes, I didn’t say: you’d hardly want us visiting at other times. Would you?

I don’t know if I’ll win or not. If I do I’d somehow like to address that disengagement by working out how to communicate better, how to keep an involvement going for the next four years rather than just at the end of it.