It appears that the Liberal Democrats have turned parts of the centre of Gravesend into a film set. The News Shopper has the details:
The Lib Dems have been filming in Parrock Street car park for the last two nights, which confused residents who spotted a white, double decker bus and film crews.
They also filmed in the area around Windmill Street, Railway Place and Manor Road, where traffic management was in place both nights from 5pm.
A dancing troupe and the Lib Dem party leader are expected to be filmed today, as long as the smog does not interfere.
It’s fair to say that we are intrigued and can’t wait to see the finished product. The party is certainly keen to keep an air of mystery about it. All we could drag out of a party source was a modestly understated “It’s going to be good.” And then the tone became slightly more menacing as they said that if they did tell us what it was all about, they’d have to have Paddy kill us. Ha! We could beat him in a fight. Easy.
* Newshound in training. I'm sweet and full of mischief, just like my stories.
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14 Comments
Not sure this sounds like a good idea – is this from the same brainiac who thought up the orange budget box? – if this for a PEB – the things that work are the vox pop and not the politicians . Shame the devil and speak the truth .
How does this win votes?
Whose graves end here?
So good to see all the comments about using people other than Nick Clegg have been taken on board. Who is it who thinks that if only people see a few more minutes of Nick Clegg on TV they will be more likely to vote Lib Dem ?
@David Allen 20th Mar ’15 – 8:50pm
Heart of Darkness: ” The air was dark above Gravesend, and farther back still seemed condensed into a mournful gloom, brooding motionless over the biggest, and the greatest, town on earth.”
I’m not sure whether Clegg’s playing Marlow or Kurtz, however.
Gravesend is almost without distinguishing characteristics. It is also spectacularly lacking in support for the Liberal Democrats. What is to be gained by making a video in Gravesend? Why not pick a more attractive townscape, and one with a few Lib Dems in it? Perhaps one in the West Country where our vote has been slipping dangerously to UKIP?
Caracatus: Who is it thinks that the public have such a short attention span that they might forget Nick is our leader if only we show them a couple of minutes of footage in which he doesn’t appear? The result would only be that the party would be pilloried for appearing ashamed of our leader.
The guiding force of the Lib Dem central election team has remained the same for many many years, gaily putting out the same kind of stuff without any serious question. It has powered us through a poor General Election (2010) into a disastrous AV referendum and even worse Euro elections as well as many hopeless directionless (and hence largely pointless) by-election campaigns along the way. They are fighting the election in the place they think our Party deserves to be rather than the place where we actually are. It is the electorate who have got everything wrong, not the Party leadership. So we will continue to stuff all our resources into the promotion of a broken brand. Which is, of course, what every marketing specialist in the world would tell you to do, isn’t it……..?
You may call this approach ‘denial’, ’emperor’s new clothes’, whatever you like. If you think it is going to change, suddenly, you must be in some parallel universe.
The sad thing is that we have an essentially good vote-harvesting (ie technical) core but they are like artillery being handed cucumbers to stuff into their howitzers. Who is giving the Party centrally POLITICAL direction at this time? I see no sign of anyone being involved who has experience in the political (as opposed to electoral) side of campaigning or winning elections since the 1990s.
Tony Dawson: two words: Paddy Ashdown
Caron, I am not sure that Paddy has had the necessary blank sheet of paper on which to build both his team and his strategy. He has always been radical and iconoclastic, and all the better for that. He is a natural insurgent.
I simply cannot believe that he has ever seen his personal vision for the Liberal Democrats being to ‘anchor them in the centre ground’.
Especially when the so called ‘centre’ that the party is trying to anchor to is actually now right of centre – see the interesting research on the location of the centre by Essex University and referred to here: http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/81773000/gif/_81773059_political_centre_464v3.gif
Take a person that nobody trusts, who everybody has stopped listening to, and let that person deliver his personally chosen message that is indistinguishable to that of a party with an entrenched reputation for representing that ‘position’ and you get no space, no attention., no traction,
Paddy is masterminding Operation Dynamo.(Dunkirk). I think in years to come he’ll regret not demanding the personnel with which to put together Operation Overlord ( Normandy).
That is why I thought Tony’s ‘appreciation of the situation’ was accurate and precise, and noted that it is rare for him to be critical on the public forum. Things must be tough.
Caron, Is this the same Paddy Ashdown who thinks we only beat the Monster Raving Loonies by 40 votes in the Bootle by-election in 1990, so the Rochester result of 2014 was not a problem?
Vote Lib Dem. Get a dance troupe in every village and town in the UK. Entertainment for the masses. It’s the secret policy weapon that can’t make matters any worse. I think it’s inspired.
Just a thought but could we have not saved money and added to the green credentials by recycling old Orange mobile ads.
“The air was dark above Gravesend, and farther back still seemed condensed into a mournful gloom, brooding motionless over the biggest, and the greatest, town on earth.”
Perhaps Nick was intended to look good by comparison?