Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Annual General Ice-Cream Eating
Tonight’s excitement centres on St Margaret’s Church Hall (when in the world does it not?!), for the Annual General Meeting of Bury Liberal Democrats. I believe that, were it not for ongoing industrial action, the event would be leading the BBC Evening News.
However, we aren’t ones to be felled by anything, not even that, and so the meeting carries on regardless. I am standing for election to the Executive of the local party, as Membership Secretary. Hopefully I will win, and have the chance to continue building on our growing membership in the area. We learned at Kick-Start at the weekend the value of a hard-working band of members, and whilst we have that already, it’s always nice to have more.
With that in mind I started early yesterday, and attempted whilst at the threatre to convince my Mother to join the Party. To no avail, alas. She did tell me that she’d voted for us in all of the recent elections (“I used to vote Labour when your Father lived with us, but then I realised that it was a secret ballot, so I voted for you lot because I always was a Liberal at heart…”). “Hurrah!” I thought. “Time to close the deal…” Sadly, at this point Mum was distracted by a passing programme / ice cream vendor, and returned with a tub of vanilla but with a somewhat dampened ardour for the principles of Liberal Democracy. And my plans were thwarted.
Which is a worrying fact in my book, and perhaps not one I shall be mentioning at the AGM prior to the election this evening. If I can’t convince a seasoned Lib Dem voter, who is also my own MOTHER, to join up ahead of gorging herself on ice cream, then my chances elsewhere may be a little less good.
Still, I am not a quitter, and we shall see how the election pans out.
Regardless of that, what is certain to be mentioned is how successful this year has been for the party locally. Aside from the elections, where we successfully defended a seat in Sedgley, and elected Donal O’Hanlon in St Mary’s (coming from third to first and ousting the sitting Mayor), we have also been pivotal in the Save Prestwich Arts College success, led the way in getting the Council to sort out The Retreat, sorted out some of the traffic problems in Prestwich Village, and worked with communities across the Borough on lots of other important initiatives. The Party locally has held its first annual dinner, signed up more members, raised more money, and produced and delivered more leaflets. We are certainly on the up!
I, however, am on the down. Down to London, that is (ho ho), where I will be overnight tomorrow with work. So there’ll be no blog until Friday. The results of the election will have to wait until then. But in the meantime, if you get a phone call which begins “Hello, have you thought about joining the Liberal Democrats, and how far away from the nearest choc-ice are you?” you’ll know that I’ve won!
Rick
However, we aren’t ones to be felled by anything, not even that, and so the meeting carries on regardless. I am standing for election to the Executive of the local party, as Membership Secretary. Hopefully I will win, and have the chance to continue building on our growing membership in the area. We learned at Kick-Start at the weekend the value of a hard-working band of members, and whilst we have that already, it’s always nice to have more.
With that in mind I started early yesterday, and attempted whilst at the threatre to convince my Mother to join the Party. To no avail, alas. She did tell me that she’d voted for us in all of the recent elections (“I used to vote Labour when your Father lived with us, but then I realised that it was a secret ballot, so I voted for you lot because I always was a Liberal at heart…”). “Hurrah!” I thought. “Time to close the deal…” Sadly, at this point Mum was distracted by a passing programme / ice cream vendor, and returned with a tub of vanilla but with a somewhat dampened ardour for the principles of Liberal Democracy. And my plans were thwarted.
Which is a worrying fact in my book, and perhaps not one I shall be mentioning at the AGM prior to the election this evening. If I can’t convince a seasoned Lib Dem voter, who is also my own MOTHER, to join up ahead of gorging herself on ice cream, then my chances elsewhere may be a little less good.
Still, I am not a quitter, and we shall see how the election pans out.
Regardless of that, what is certain to be mentioned is how successful this year has been for the party locally. Aside from the elections, where we successfully defended a seat in Sedgley, and elected Donal O’Hanlon in St Mary’s (coming from third to first and ousting the sitting Mayor), we have also been pivotal in the Save Prestwich Arts College success, led the way in getting the Council to sort out The Retreat, sorted out some of the traffic problems in Prestwich Village, and worked with communities across the Borough on lots of other important initiatives. The Party locally has held its first annual dinner, signed up more members, raised more money, and produced and delivered more leaflets. We are certainly on the up!
I, however, am on the down. Down to London, that is (ho ho), where I will be overnight tomorrow with work. So there’ll be no blog until Friday. The results of the election will have to wait until then. But in the meantime, if you get a phone call which begins “Hello, have you thought about joining the Liberal Democrats, and how far away from the nearest choc-ice are you?” you’ll know that I’ve won!
Rick
# posted by Richard Baum @ 18:28 
