The surge of new volunteers and supporters which has come in following the first TV debate and the rise of the party to unprecedented election campaign polling heights means that often there are people wanting to help in areas where existing local parties don’t have that much for them to do.
As I wrote when giving local parties suggestions on how to respond to this new help:
Two basic principles apply:
- Don’t abandon targeting – big surges of votes in 1974 and 1983 did not turn into many extra seats. The party has since learned how to work the system far better – and the party’s targeting plans for this election were already massively more ambitious than ever before.
- But similarly don’t think that the way to get a new person involved is to say, “Thanks very much, but we don’t really want your help round here.”
What many local parties have therefore done is to produce extra, non-area specific, literature that people who don’t live in target wards/seats can deliver in their own patch in addition to joining in with those targeting activities.
Not everywhere has done so, so if you’re stuck wanting to help but not having something to do, here’s an A4 black and white leaflet you can print off and deliver in your own street or village. It’s double-sided and you fold it in half before putting in through a letterbox.
Note: if you are going to spend more than £50 on printing costs for producing this leaflet you must get in touch with the local Liberal Democrat party so as to make sure that the production costs are covered properly under the rules covering both election expenses and donations of gifts in kind to the party. (Some of the relevant thresholds are higher than £50 but that’s the lowest level at which the rules may kick in.)
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12 Comments
As a Civil Servant in a “politically restricted” grade I am not permitted to deliver leaflets as it is deemed to be “canvassing”, but can display posters. That does seem somewhat contradictory!
Surely to God, Mark, the way to win over undecided or wavering voters is to appeal to their sense of fairness in the voting system.
Yet where is it here? In the third sentence, buried under that most anodyne of headings, ‘Cleaning up Westminster’. Which of us hasn’t had a leaflet from 1, 2, 3 maybe 4 parties with that message?
A really effective message is about the value of a vote and how the Liberal Democrats will really “make your vote count” in future elections if they are given a chance on Thursday.
Most people don’t know that only 1 in 5 votes count under our current electoral system – PRINT THAT .
Less than 1 in 3 seats have changed hands since the 2nd World War (29 to be precise.) – PRINT THAT.
We all know that Cameron’s idea of cleaning up Westminster will be to reduce a selected 10% of MPs (“it will save the taxpayer thousands of pounds” says my on -message Conservative candidate) and we can guess whose seats they will choose. It is a cunning, almost fraudulent way of ensuring perpetual power once they’ve secured a majority.
You mention the Liberal surge of 1974 and the Alliance Party surge of 1983, when the Labour vote fell away as it’s doing now.
In the former election the Liberals won nearly 6 MILLION votes (18.3%) and gained 2% of the seats – just 13 !
Nearly 8 MILLION votes (over 25%) in 1983 gave the Liberal/SDP Alliance 3.5% of the seats, just 23 in all for MORE THAN A QUARTER OF VOTES CAST. Yes, you have to look twice at that one !
When they’ve finished misrepresenting us on amnesties for illegal immigrant and joining the Euro, 70% of the press, to varying degrees, will come for us – forecasting an apocalypse should there be no overall majority.
With an imminent Labour collapse I agree with Mark that the dangers of another 1983 could be very real. Liberal Democrats should therefore abandon principle and urge tactical voting where necessary to keep the Conservatives from gaining a long period in power. PLEASE HELP GET THIS MESSAGE OUT TO VOTERS if you agree.
Thank you.
People dont vote “for systems” – reforming the system and proportional representation havent done us much good in the past, look at the London Mayoral election where it was a prominent plank of the campaign. Goodness, some of us can recall when campaigning was full of “systems” – Site Value Rating, Single Transferable Vote and the like, used to get us 10 per cent of the total vote and a lost-deposit after lost-deposit. Now its all “change that works for you” and “change you can believe in” and “things can be different” – but lets not groan….who has seen an opinion poll like the one in today’s Daily Mail five days before polling day?
We certainly can’t do better under the present “system”, Philip.
Sean: I agree changing the voting system is important, but for most voters I’ve talked with it’s not the one and only issue in their minds – sorting out the economy, voting out MPs who abused expenses, making taxes fairer and so on all matter too. So the issue should be there prominently, but balanced with other issues – as the leaflet does.
OK Mark.
I’ve just been on R4 ‘Any Answers’ so I’ve got it off my chest, so to speak.
Good luck in the last few days but I still fear the tabloids – although Roy Greenslade in the Gurdian may be a bit wide of the mark this time when he suggests that, apart from the influence of Twitter, the election result may be in the hands of Sun readers.
Thanks for this very helpful leaflet; it’s going into letterboxes this weekend. 🙂 Keep pushing, folks!
This is great and has already been posted on the “RATM” Facebook Group
“Nick Clegg now in contention as potential PM”
Let’s be realistic.
It’s a great idea, but what does it mean for expenditure limits in any particular constituency? Should this be cleared with individual Agents first? (I was taught that no-one should ever incur any expenditure without the Agent knowing, but maybe the Rules have changed nowadays.)
David: the rules did changes (mostly in 2000); hence the final part of the piece.
Do you have any measurement mechanisms in place which allowed you to measure the effectiveness of your leaftet distribution? Many parties used this method to distribute information I am wondering whether the success was measured.