Southall Sunday

And so with a couple of fellow Hackney councillors to Southall for a morning's campaigning, a part of London I last visited in 1996 when I tried and failed to become their full-time Organiser (Southall CLP wanted me, Ealing N and Ealing Action didn't, so they readvertised and ended up appointing Parmjit Dhanda, now the MP for Gloucester and helping run the current by-election).


The campaign seems well organised, with a second full-colour leaflet going out featuring Virendra only 4 days after his selection and posters up in a huge number of local shops and restaurants.

I saw the Lib Dem candidate out and about (but with only one helper) and the LD single-transferable black-and-white leaflet featuring shonky bar chart of the 2005 result was in evidence.

The Tories are clearly chucking money at the campaign, with huge Tony Lit posters on the side of a local cinema and loudspeaker cars going round, but I didn't see much evidence of activists on the ground. This could reflect the local party going on strike in protest at Cameron imposing a brand new member on them as candidate.

The real story seems to be a battle for second place between the Tories and Lib Dems - for high stakes as either Cameron's or Campbell's leadership could be on the line if they come third.