A Day of Canvassing

I sent an e-mail, was told to phone, then told to phone back later that evening and was then given a date and time. You could say that I was lucky in arranging a day to follow my local MP on his campaign for the general election.

Arriving early for my 10:00am start on Wednesday 22^nd April, I waited for the Conservative Member of Parliament for Fareham. On the phone I was told to meet Mark Hoban and his team in the car park of the White Hart Pub in Portchester where I could then simply observe or assist with their canvassing.

A woman in a red car was already parked when I pulled into the pub but as it was still only 9:48am I decided to wait until more people arrived until I got out of the car. I recognised Mark Hoban from his picture as he pulled into the car park not long after this. He approached me straight away to introduce himself properly, shook my hand and explained what was going to be happening for the day.

Sue Bell and Nick Walker, who are both councillors for Fareham Borough Council, also came to introduce themselves and discuss some points with Mark. All in all there were six of us helping Mark with his canvassing for the upcoming election.

As Portchester is my hometown, I knew roads fairly well and could have walked to most of the places, but it was easier and quicker to drive and follow the three cars. We drove to the first neighbourhood of the day where I was given the ‘literature’, which consisted of three piles of leaflets. I also had the privilege of wearing the Conservative rosette.

The unspoken rule applied when going from door to door. Once we’d knocked the door, we’d step back and wait roughly 20 seconds for someone to answer the door and if no one came, we’d post the literature through their letterbox.

‘Sorry we missed you’ leaflets were being posted through a few of the doors due to most people being at work. So we knocked on the first door and I stood slightly back first of all so I could get more of a feel for the situation.

"Hi, we’re with Mark Hoban the Conservative MP for this area and we were wondering if you’d be voting for us on May 6^th?"

From this we’d take their response and tell Sue, who would make a note of it on the many pieces of paper she was carrying. Sue had records of the way people had voted in the past, or if they even voted at all. Politics is not a strong subject of mine so I was surprised to see this as I was under the impression that all data regarding votes were kept secret.

Having the names of the residents in each house made a difference when talking to them. When addressing them by their last names they seemed to respond positively knowing they were being treated as individual citizens rather than just a vote.

Within some of the houses, young people answered but the majority didn’t state the way in which they were voting. In a few cases people would wait until we’ve asked who they were voting for to state that they did not live at that house and they were simply cleaning it or there to do the gardening.

A row of houses were raised and the front of the first house was covered in plants and flowers. The elderly man who lived there was sat in his porch enjoying what was a lovely day. When asked if he would be voting Conservative in the general election he shouted:

"I’m not voting, what a load of rubbish."

It became obvious to me that local issues affect Portchester more because it is more of an elderly community. When walking from street to street I noticed a number of posters put up in people’s windows that said ‘Hands off our car park’. Nick Walker would approach the majority of houses with these posters up because a rumour had been spread about Portchester Community Centre.

The centre has been standing for many years but is now deteriorating and is in need of refurbishment. Fareham Borough Council has been putting ideas on the table for renovation of the centre but some suggestions mean the car park will no longer be in use. The amount of posters up around the community meant Nick Walker spent most of the morning going to each house, setting the story straight that no plans had in fact been finalised.

After being informed of the misleading story, many residents were then happy to speak to Nick about other issues and were far more responsive.

As there were only six of us, I spent time with everyone and ask a few questions. But I was shocked to find out that once other parties had been canvassing, if their literature was not posted fully through the letterbox, the next party would take leaflets out with the hope that it would increase their chances of receiving more votes.

We then went to another neighbourhood, still in Portchester and even more ‘Hands off our car park’ posters. As there were so many Mark decided to go to these houses too, and at this point I was walking with him to see how people respond to their Conservative MP.

When people opened their doors, Mark would ask if he would be receiving their vote and if not would be intrigued as to why. He would mention the poster they had in their window and would ask what they knew about the situation. When stated that the closure of the car park was a rumour, a woman said, "Oh…I didn’t realise".

It’s amazing to see how much a local issue can sway people’s voting preferences. People began to listen when Mark was explaining what the local council is in fact trying to do, instead of what the rumours are suggesting.

Radio News Story 4

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Script:

More than ten thousand hospital appointments have been missed in Andover War Memorial and the Royal Hampshire County Hospital between April and September.

Winchester and Eastleigh NHs Trust are now asking patients to notify hospitals is they can no longer make an appointment.

Missed appointments will not result in patients being referred back to their GP.

A patient from the Royal Hampshire County Hospital explained how it could affect him.

Radio News Story 3

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Script:

A ‘wheels to work’ scheme is being introduced in the Winchester district to help sixteen to twenty five years old, who have limited access to public transport, get to work, college or interviews.

This scheme allows young people to borrow mopeds for a maximum of twelve months which will cost twelve pounds per week.

Winchester City Council and Hampshire County Council have given funding for twelve mopeds to be fully taxed and insured, so young people, who cannot afford their own cars, have some means of transport.

News Day 2 Bulletin

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Script:

Two robbers threatened a cashier on Sunday night in the Shell garage on Weyhill Road, Andover.

The employee gave the men the remaining money in the till after being threatened with a metal bar and a firearm.

It is known that the men drove away in blue Renualt Clio, but detectives are encouraging anyone who was at the petrol station, near the time of the incident, to give any information they have to help with the enquiry.

Potholes are causing a dramatic increase in the number of insurance claims due to damage on cars and bicycles.

To repair all major potholes on our roads one hundred and forty million pounds will be deducted from the council’s budget, as each pothole costs seventy pounds to repair.

The AA has been tracking this increase for the last two years.

Two hundred thousand pounds has been awarded to Fareham Borough Council in order to create an Eco-town within Hampshire.

The Eco-town will consist of seven thousand new homes, schools, shops, community centres and a large amount of open space.

Money will also go towards a new ‘green’ development site, which will focus on green space and renewable energy.

Executive Leader for Fareham Borough Council, Sean Woodward, said this will have a positive impact on local neighbourhoods.

AUDIO

Money will be raised for homeless charities as people take part in ‘Winchester Walk for the Homeless’ on Sunday the 9^th of May.

Fifty thousand pound is hoping to be raised by people walking to sites such as the Itchen River and returning to Winchester Cathedral.

Celebrations will be held at the Cathedral between 12 and 3:30 for people who have taken part.

News Day 2: Eco-Town

To hear the full story click here

Script:

£200,000 has been awarded to Fareham Borough Council in order to create an eco-town within Hampshire.

The eco-town will consist of 7,000 new homes, schools, shops, community centres and a large amount of open space.
Money will also go towards a new 'green' development site which will focus on green space and renewable energy.

Executive Leader for Fareham Borough Council, Seàn Woodward, said this programme will have a positive impact on local neighbourhoods.

William Cobbett & Charles Dickens - HCJ Lecture

• Cobbett: Born in March 1763 and died in June 1835. He was known for being a pamphleteer, farmer and journalist.
• His main belief was that in order to end the poverty of farm labourers, there needed to be a reform in the government and an abolition of ‘rotten boroughs’ – Boroughs which could gain undue and unrepresentative influence within Parliament.
• Cobbett was an anti-radical who became a radical. The thing that changed him was the plight of farm workers in the early 19^th Century. He thought that rapid industrialisation was going to destroy traditional ways of life.
• Cobbett spent about 20 years abroad, in America and France, in the army but when he returned from war, he was shocked at the state of the countryside.
• "When farmers became gentlemen, labourers became slaves."
• Cobbett has no time for the government that taxed farmers, or the army who he says, are free loaders, or the church and it’s tithes.
• He was nearly 60 when he began writing Rural Rides.
• He then went on to write the Political Register which was read by the working class.
• A tax on newspapers led Cobbett to publish the Political Register as a pamphlet, which had a circulation of 40,000.
• He was put in Newgate prison for sedition and fled to America to avoid another jail term. Cobbett was charged with libel three times after returning.

　

• Dickens:
• Charles Dickens was born 7^th February 1812 and died 9^th June 1870. He was an English novelist.
• He was interested in particular times in Reform. Oliver Twist is a good example of this, as it was concerned with the Benthamite Utilitarian Poor Law, which he saw as an oppression regime for people.
• In Bleak House the particular abuse that he’s bothered by is the Court of Chancery – and the law cases that went on for generations and cost a fortune. But it becomes a metaphor for all that’s wrong with Victorian Society.
• Dickens was disappointed with the law.
• As a writer he is calling on his reader to act. "Dear Reader! It rests with you and me whether similar things shall be or not."

• A tale of two revolutions – and two perspectives – Urban (Dickens) and Rural (Cobbett)
• England did well from the French Revolution – it was very expensive during Napoleonic War – income tax was created in 1799 to pay for the war effort.
• British Naval power was absolute (certainly after 1805) and the blockades of the French ports destroyed French trade and created a boom for British exports – to such an extent that British manufacturers were actually clothing the French Army.
• With the other European armies occupied, the British started building it’s empire – India, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka – trading monopoly with South America
• The Transatlantic Trade – enormously profitable for Britain – 16^th Century one million slaves transported from Africa to America – 17^th Century three million – 18^th Century seven million. Abolition of Slavery Act 1833.
• Textiles made up 60% of exports. Coal output doubled between 1750 and 1800.
• Manchester went from 17,000 to 18,000 people from 1760 to 1830. The city was seen as revolutionary, it was something that had never before been seen. Marx and Engels.
• Cotton was key to the Industrial Revolution – the raw material came from the slave plantations in the American South – but it was the modern Lancashire which produced the finished article – mainly for export.
• Inventions (Gas light) allowed process to be done in enormous factories by mostly women and children.
• The end of the war meant end of the boom – this caused widespread unemployment and a steep fall in wages. In response to this the government brought in the Corn Laws which put in a tariff on imported grains.
• Conditions in towns and cities were dire – most people lived in slums and Cholera was common.
• The penalty of brutal repression on any sort of dissent and strict penal penalties (exportation – tolpuddle martyrs) was effective in short term
• Peterloo (steamed from Waterloo) Massacre – 1819 Manchester – cavalry charged a crowd of 60,000 demanding parliamentary reform – 11 people died.
• The protesters demanded that growing industrial towns of Britain should have the right to elect MPs. Less than 2% of the population had the vote at the time, and resentment was sharpened by the ‘rotten boroughs’ such as the village Old Sarum which had 11 voters and two MPs. Manchester and Leeds had none. Reform Act 1832.
• Repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846 meant that bread became cheaper but wages could be lowered because workers could survive on less.
• Farming:
• Enclosures had ended the idea of landholding peasantry – and there was nothing to stop the transfer of the workforce from non-industrial to industrial.
• Population had been rising only slowly or not even rising – from about five million people at the end of the 17^th Century until the middle of the 18^th Century.
• (Seminar notes – Cobbett wants to see people working for a living on the countryside – but there is no countryside left)
• After 1770 is started to rise dramatically – doubling every fifty years after that – although Cobbett disputed that with evidence of the populations in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.
• Swing Riots – Rural labourers opposed to the use of new advanced technology such as threshing machine

• The Poor:
  The poor were looked after by the Speenhamland System which was devised as a means to alleviate the distress caused by high grain prices.
• Means Tested was a top up for wages, which was dependent on the number of children a family had and the price of bread.
• The immediate impact of paying this poor rate, fell on the land owners of the parish concerned.
• New Poor Law Act 1834. The Act that stated that no able-bodied person was to receive money or other help from the Poor Law Authorities except in a workhouse.
• Bentham argued that people did what was pleasant and would not do what was unpleasant, therefore if people were not to claim relief, the relief had to be unpleasant. This was the core of the argument for ‘stigmatising’ relief, making it in the happy phrase of the time, ‘an abject of wholesome horror’.
• The Act effectively criminalised the Poor

• Ireland (Act of Union 1801)
  Joined UK in this year
• During the years of famine, Ireland was a new exporter of food, armed troops escorted the crops to the ports to be exported to England. The export of livestock actually increased during the famine years.

　

Facebook Abuser

Reading the Sun today, I came across a story which I found quite disturbing mainly due to the lack of public awareness.

Dyanne Littler was engaged to a man who she met on Facebook and thought she knew well. It turns out that she knew little about him because police chose to keep his criminal past a secret. Peter Chapman raped and murdered a 17-year-old girl, but Dyanne knew nothing about this until police informed her, luckily before she married him.

Dyanne Littler deserved to know the truth about the man she was about to marry, but he became a danger to society, as no one knew the truth, which brought him that much closer to almost hurting someone else.

Peter Chapman uses a fake identity on Facebook to talk to females. This is how he met Ashleigh Hall the 17-year-old girl, who he murdered. Ashleigh’s mother asked Facebook to install a panic button, so girls can report men who they think may be dangerous. Facebook have rejected this request though. Something like a panic button would make social networking sites, like Facebook, that much safer for young girls who can be easily manipulated. I find it odd that Facebook have rejected this request because the more the site is misused, the worse the reputation of Facebook will be.