MORE readers’ reports from and about your constituencies since Nigel Farage announced that he was stepping down his candidates in 317 Conservative seats. See below for how to submit your own report on the choice of candidates you have, which of them you plan to vote for and why, what you think of their chances and your stance on Brexit.
CARLISLE
Current MP: John Stevenson (Conservative)
Richard Elsy writes: Carlisle is currently a Conservative marginal which was solid Labour from 1964 to 2010. The Conservative MP, John Stevenson, has a 2,599 majority which gave him 60 per cent of the vote in 2017. The constituency voted 60 per cent Leave in 2016 in spite of John Stevenson’s support for Remain.
He’s spent three years with Nick Boles, Stephen Kinnock and others trying to promote ‘Common Market II’ as an alternative to Brexit. He’s not terribly popular in the constituency, not least because of his ambiguous views on Brexit and a couple of thousand Brexit Party votes would have left him somewhat short of a majority. He’s recently told his supporters that he wouldn’t any longer object to a ‘No Deal’ outcome. This may now be enough to get him re-elected since the Brexit Party has stood down, although I wouldn’t exclude the possibility of a substantial non-voting or spoiled ballot paper chunk of the voters who are bitterly disappointed that Stevenson is now the only option they have for voting again for Leave and Brexit. He’s simply not trusted but we’ll probably vote for him anyway.
In summary, it’s now a typical two party, Tory/Labour marginal with the Labour vote being challenged by Remain voters who could put the Lib Dems into second place ahead of Labour. Once the dust has settled, we’ll have a chastened pro-Brexit Tory MP parked on the back benches again. No radical change is either possible or likely.
BIRMINGHAM EDGBASTON
Current MP: Preet Kaur Gill (Labour)
Confused of Birmingham writes: For many years until 2017 the constituency was represented by the widely respected Gisela Stuart (Labour). Knowing the EU first-hand, she took a leading role for Leave in the referendum campaign but decided not to stand for the next parliament.
In the Referendum, individual wards leaned heavily both ways and overall there was a narrow constituency majority in favour of remaining.
All I know of the parliamentary career of my MP is that she supported pressure to legislate against people who sent abusive mail to women MPs and seemed unable to grasp that it would have been discriminatory. I’m in two minds whether to vote for her Iusedtobeindecisivebutnowimnotsosure Party.
If I vote for the Conservative Party I will be endorsing a PM who considers the Vassalage2.0 Treaty a triumph, when it gives us back virtually no control and sells out the fishermen and the people of Northern Ireland. I would be supporting a parliamentary party which will still include members who actively tried to overturn a referendum result and now only fear that their party might fall off a cliff.
I would support the scarcely Liberal Democratic party only if it promised, if elected, to revoke the result of the election, and the Greens only if its members were sworn not to drive their children to school.
My support will go to the Brexit Party, the only one which promises to honour the result of a referendum which (people seem to have forgotten) asked very simply ‘yes’ or ‘no’ and was to be decided by a simple majority. It is the only party which understands that democracy has been brought into disrepute. A candidate has only just been announced and I am afraid I know nothing about him, nor as far as I can tell does the electronic fount of all wisdom. However, in trying to ‘change politics for good’ the Brexit Party has a deliberate policy of not choosing people whose only goal in life is to be PM.
NEWCASTLE-UNDER-LYME
Current MP: Paul Farrelly (Labour)
Dave Nixon writes: Our current MP Paul Farrelly (Labour) who voted against giving us an EU vote in 2011 and after the 2015 election, against triggering Article 50, against this election, has been de-selected, but nothing to do with Brexit in this ‘Leave’ constituency.
Ten years ago, I was chairman of our local UKIP and we had five Newcastle-under-Lyme borough councillors and three Staffordshire county councillors.
The Conservatives refused three months ago to accept one of the three candidates from central office. Another selection took place and local businessman Aaron Bell has been selected, but the local leader of our council, Simon Tagg, and 30-year-old councillor, Mark Holland, cannot get on the Tory candidates list. Lib/Dem Nigel Jones lost his council seat, and the Labour candidate, Carl Greatbatch, is typical of that party.
The Brexit candidate, Jason Cooper, has resigned from his NHS post to fight this election and I am thinking of voting for him because what is the point of voting Tory when they undermine everything that is conservative in this country? The 10,000 students at Keele University, recently all signed up with a postal vote, will keep Newcastle Labour.
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