General Election report Agent and Candidate AGENTS REPORT

Kim Taylor as General Election Agent. This is my first report as an Agent, and may well be my only report as I volunteered to be election agent for the General Election Only.

The Agents prime function is to ensure that

· The candidates nomination papers are correctly completed and filed on time · All campaign literature/communications is legally compliant · All expenditure is controlled and compliant · Have oversight of donations and ensure all are compliant · File election expense accounts on time with authorities

The agent has legal responsibilities for this and noncompliance results in personal criminal conviction and significant fines.

Historically in the Agent as also controlled all campaign activity acting as campaign manager and also written and produced all campaign leaflets, adverts etc.

I did not feel this high-level command and control approach was appropriate for a snap election and that we needed to adopt a more team approach and cascade campaigning activities. This would also be an important approach to test in view of the forthcoming all out election which would affect every ward and resources would be stretched thin.

A team approach was adopted with Paula Wibrew and Stephanie Grant acted as Campaign Managers on the ground and Martin Heath as Social Media Campaign manager and Andrew McCormick ensuring donation were received and processed legally.

It was the intention that for every ward this would be cascaded down further with each ward nominating a Campaign Co-ordinator from existing candidates/councillors to coordinate the activities in their ward such as the management of volunteers, delivering leaflets, canvasing and the Polling day activities. This approach will be vital for the all outs in May and so needed to be practiced during the General Election.

Unfortunately, co-operation was lacking in the wards of Norden, Popley East, and Brookvale which represent the Labour vote of Basingstoke. Following the defection of those councillors we now know why that was the case.

Fortunately, the Women’s Forum was on hand and its small but determined membership campaigned their hearts out closing those gaps. This did mean that time was taken away from canvasing to achieve this.

My thanks goes to our Councillors and Local Candidates who did step up, the Women’s Forum and all the fantastic members who worked incredibly hard. All of our thanks should also go to our very excellent Candidate Kerena Marchant.

In the six week campaign we delivered 35, 000 leaflets through volunteer effort, sent letters to postal voters had a freepost leaflet delivered to 52,500 homes, delivered 10,000 GOTV cards to known labour supporters in key wards, made contact with about 900 people on the doorstep, placed online and Gazette adverts, had a social media campaign and mounted a polling day effort to knock up voters to remind them to vote. We spent a little over £8,000. Outcomes

The results are to be expected in the light of the various difficulties with a short campaign heavily affected by Brexit. We contained the Tory vote, maintaining Labour as second place and the only convincing challenger. Despite a massive attempt by the Lib Dems to challenge us they remain a poor third.

It was clear from canvassing in wards that traditionally vote labour in local elections that the GE was heavily influenced by Brexit, and that many of these labour voters were “leavers”. The opportunity was taken to deliver leaflets and canvass in wards where we do not normally have a presence such as Hatchwarren and Beggerwood, and Chineham. There was a more supportive feedback from those areas.

As a result of our activities in these areas we saw a significant increase in new members from Hatchwarren and Beggerwood, and Chineham.

On the night of the count we had about 10 volunteers to help undertake the sampling exercise to get an idea of which wards our votes come from. This is about a third of what is required to do this effectively but in general terms our experience on the doorstep was reflected in the intelligence we gathered on the door. Our traditional areas voted Try in the General Election. People vote differently in a general election to how they vote in a Local Election.

Lessons to learn

Six weeks is a very short time to try to mount an effective campaign,

New wards will be double the sizes for the all outs and campaigning teams need to be bigger

GOTV cards need to be delivered over the week before the election because wards are bigger

An effective polling day effort cannot be mounted with less than 8-10 people per ward in the newer bigger wards

That a team of approx. 25-30 people are needed to manage the count effectively and gain usable management information

Mass leafleting drops can deliver to a ward (new ward size) in one day where there are two sessions with about 20 people involved

More mass drops and teams are needed as wards will double in size to about 5000 each. Councillors/Candidates cannot deliver all their leaflets on their own

Hatchwarren and Beggarwood may be a potential target ward for the future. Kerena Marchant Candidates General Election Report Basingstoke CLP

The run up to the election The PPC selection took place in February/March 2019 with an all woman’s shortlist. Basingstoke was not an ESS. This meant that I was selected 10 months before the election. In my view a candidate in any constituency needs at least 2 years to build up a campaign and this view comes from sharing experience and campaigning strategies with the PPCs in ESS who welcomed me into their group. However, our end result in a leave constituency was better than many of theirs, despite the shorter run up time.

It could be said that choosing a candidate who does not live in the constituency is a disadvantage and I do concur with this. Your place of residence is on the ballot paper and this influences the perception of some of the voters. However, I was familiar with Basingstoke having spent a great deal of time in Basingstoke over the years. Due to working part time, I was able to spend 3 days a week in the constituency from pre-selection to September when I was full time in the constituency. I feel that 2-3 days a week is what any candidate local or otherwise should spend on the campaign and this should cover – meeting local groups and being part of them (this builds up trust and gets people talking); taking on casework, attending CLP and EC meetings, getting involved in local campaigns, social media campaign, local press exposure about local issues and holding the Tories to account, door knocking and leafleting supporting local councillors and as part of the campaign.

The timing of my selection was also not ideal as it clashed with local elections, European elections and councillor selections for critical all outs, where it was best to put the election campaign on hold so it didn’t distract from these.

Ideally every election campaign should be a long campaign with an advance door knocking with a deep listening conversion script and leafleting starting at least 2 years prior to the election. This is critical with where the Labour Party is now. Our traditional voters moved away from us in the GE and new votes gained are in areas we have yet to collect data on and identify voters e.g. Hatchwarren, Beggarwood, Chineham, Rooksdown. A candidate also needs to work alongside councillors to build trust in traditional Labour areas e.g Buckskin, Popley, , Norden, , . Inclusion in councillor’s leaflets in some of these areas helped. Getting involved with the local councillors with activities like litter picking and bulb planting also helps build trust.

As a Disabled candidate I faced unfavourable treatment from the Government Equalities Department decision in July 2019 not to restore the Access to Elected Office Fund or divert the EnAble Fund to cover the GE. This took the Parties by surprise and there is no speedy and clear mechanism in the Labour Party for Disabled candidates to get Disabled access support from selection to election except via the slow and uncertain process of applying for bursaries and grants. Even when I successfully did get a grant in October, I still had been paying out of small savings for interpreters with some interpreters donating their time or holding on to invoices. Even now I am unclear the amount of the grant and how much I will get back.

I was grateful to members of Basingstoke CLP donating their time as interpreters or communicators. This saved on interpreting support and I am grateful to these CLP members.

I was very disadvantaged at conference. I went to conference to network and get funding and endorsements for the campaign. However, the interpreting support promised by the Party did not materialise and the communicators I booked at the 11th hour were not allowed in due to security. I’m grateful to Disability Labour, DPAC and John McDonnell for taking this up.

To sum up, in the run up to the election I spent 2-3 days in the constituency and at least another day at home on correspondence, case work, research and administration. It would be fair to say this was a full-time occupation. What I achieved was:

· A social media campaign with a following of 600 on both FB and twitter · An election video that was donated · A web page that a member built · Regular attendance at community groups e.g. Basingstoke Multi Cultural Forum, CAB, MENCAP, BDF, Ice Rink, Football club, and many more. · Regular visits to local institutions e.g. foodbank, Camrose, QMC, Julian House, mosque, · Focus group work · Ran register to vote days at QMC and Festival Place · Supporting councillors with litter picks and local leafleting · Case work · Trying to get exposure in local press – radio, TV, newspapers (difficult as in favour of MM) · Attended conference to lobby support and funding

The Woman’s Group Prior to the election Paula Wibrew and Stephanie Grant re-launched the woman’s group as a campaign resource. Skills were identified and this group became a driving force behind the campaign with my agent and 2 campaign managers coming from this group. The regular Thursday meetings became regular leafleting and door knocking and members of this group worked throughout the build up to the election and through the election as part of the group activities and outside of it. We attracted new active members as the campaign went on. Several of the woman developed confidence as activists and worked in pairs to door knock, leaflet, deliver GOTV outside the group and now want to be actively involved on the EC and as potential councillors.

This is now a valuable campaign resource within the CLP.

Fundraising Due to the limited time prior to the election and the need for the CLP to campaign in local elections, European and select council candidates there was no time to run fund raising activities.

We did however attract a lot of generous donations, including from non-Labour party members. Members of the CLP were extremely generous. People who were on benefits also donated small amounts.

I was disappointed not to get funding from the unions. This was for a number of reasons. My own union BECTU is now no longer affiliated to the Labour Party. NUBSLI consulted their members and wanted to give a sizable donation to the campaign but as they are part of UNISON, they had to go via UNISON. This was turned down by UNISON who wanted to put the funding towards target seats in the SE rather than support an under represented group in Westminster or one of the smaller unions affiliated to them, who had an interest in securing access to an MP.

Endorsements At conference I got endorsements from Disability Labour DPAC Labour for A Green New Deal (this included Grace Blakley helping the campaign) Angela Rayner John McDonnell

I was unfortunate that the election came before Angela Rayner’s planned visit to Basingstoke.

A Winter Campaign A winter campaign is extremely challenging. For safety reasons we did not work in the dark. You cannot door knock, leave a calling card and then go back in the evening to catch up with people who are out. You have only mornings and afternoons. This was a difficulty identified by the Labour Party and the plan was to use the Party’s virtual call system Dialogue and we were told at Conference that Dialogue was what would win the election for us. However, this was not working until the third week of the campaign and it is arguable how effectively it was working as contacts made were not always recorded. We had DPAC, NUBSLI and Disability Labour members across the UK phoning for us as well as some CLPs all working to Kim Taylor, the Agent’s Dialogue Briefing document and contacts weren’t recorded. This was also apparent in Basingstoke.

Learning for a future campaign may be a call centre.

A Short Campaign plagued by Brexit Due to a short campaign, the strategy was to target the known Labour voters in traditional wards. However due to Brexit it was clear from door knocking that they were not going to support a peoples Vote or any remain stance and the Labour Party for adopting a Peoples vote.

We therefore decided to also target areas that would have been part of a long campaign e.g Chineham, Hatchwarren and Rooksdown. It was heartening to see that we did have support there among voters in these areas and our leaflets went down well there. Whilst some were tactical voters, others supported Labour policies on the NHS, Education, the Environment and well being. For future elections it may be worth doing 2 separate leaflets, one for “new” areas and one for traditional Labour wards.

What I feel we did right in this election, which was also key to the success in Putney was to translate national issues into local ones and run on that e.g. The promised new hospital, local school cuts, the needs for local leisure, a Green New Deal for and environmental issues in Basingstoke, local poverty and welfare issues.

The result may not have gone our way. However, compared with the national result, we did well. Maria Miller increasing her majority by only 83 and doing this by taking our Brexit vote was not a bad result. Our team of PPC, Agent and campaign managers had never done this before and we did the best we could and learnt a great deal. Everything from door knocking to hustings was a learning experience for me and I enjoyed it and learnt a great deal. I cannot praise my agent, Kim Taylor and campaign managers Stephanie Grant and Paula Wibrew enough, nor all those who came out in support.

Where the Party Could Have Helped Us More To me there was a huge difference between the 2017 and 2019 manifestos. 2017 had the advantage a conference in September and time to put the policies into the manifesto for 2017 fully costed. Fisher also wrote it well, so it was easy to navigate and see polices and costs. 2019 was cobbled together and it was difficult to see policy and cost, even with recourse to the grey book and this led to a great deal of confusion from press and public and opened the flood gates to mis-reporting of policy in the press. It also didn’t contain a number of polices that got thrown into the election arena as the election progressed e.g. Broadband, WASPI. This led to a great of confusion from the electorate and press e.g I had a number of emails from WASPI thinking because they had continued working they weren’t eligible for the compensation offered by Labour.

The Labour Press office was hopeless. The daily press briefings were wordy and unhelpful except for giving the theme and releases for the next day. Martin Heath the CLP Social Media and Comms officer and I worked well on linking these to the local campaign and planning social media. However, the failure of the Labour press and communications team to come up with strap lines like getting Brexit done and the mantra of conservative promises like 20,000 officers was a disaster. We were selling complicated policy without strap lines. They were also incapable at biting back at press attacks e.g over polices such as corporation tax and slurs.

The Labour Party Policy Unit in contrast was excellent. I consulted them throughout the campaign on issues like IR35, WASPI compensation, grants and loans for electric vehicles and their response was instant and delivered.

The Election The timing of the election and readiness of the National Party for this election was far from ideal but we made the most of what we had.

What was significant was the massive support of the CLP members for the campaign with so many of them turning out for the weekday and weekend campaign activities, donating towards the campaign. At every event we had new people. We were also assisted by Labour members in Alton, Reading and London. Councillors worked well alongside the campaign team in their wards. However, I do feel that we were set back by the impact of the noticeable absence and subsequent defection of Labour Councillors in Norden, Popley East and Brookvale and members had to divert their energies to working those wards and not help with the main campaign. This cost us about 9 days in people time.

We worked as follows: · A mass leaflet drop promoted by the campaign team in each of the Labour wards · Targeted mass leaflet drops in new areas · Targeted door knocking in both traditional and new areas · Main election leaflet to 52,000 houses in Basingstoke · Aim was to give the Torys the feeling that we were everywhere! · Turn outs for leafleting and door knocking was excellent · GOTV cards and follow up of known Labour voters

Another bonus of the campaign were the new members who joined the Party or supported the campaign without joining.

I cannot thank Basingstoke CLP enough for their support of the campaign.