The best manure in Burnt Oak

The ward level detail of the voting in the elections on 3 May is available here (scroll down to Useful downloads).

The Barnet votes for the constituency member on the London Assembly, the contest in which Andrew Dismore beat Brian Coleman, are:

Remember, there is all sorts of other detail on the Excel sheet, eg, how Camden voted, the breakdown of ward votes for the mayoral election, etc. Hours of endless amusement and Excel practice, including basic arithmetic!

Here are the votes and percentages for the ward I live in, Burnt Oak:

Candidate           Vote              Percentage
Coleman CON      360               13.9
Corby UKIP         149                5.8
Dismore LAB       1885              72.9
Poppy GRN          95                 3.7
Richards LD         96                 3.7
TOTAL                2585             100

Obviously, this is one of Dismore's best wards!

I did something I haven't done in a long time before the election, and spent a couple of happy days canvassing and knocking up for the Labour Party. I live in Burnt Oak, but as with most people and the areas they live in, I really only knew the few roads I traverse on the way to the shops or the tube station. I finally got to go around my ward.

Burnt Oak is, almost solidly, one working class estate. Dismore did well almost everywhere throughout his new constituency, Barnet and Camden, but it's no surprise he did particularly well here in Burnt Oak.

I walked around in a team with Dismore on the day of the election. Andrew was dog tired; I wish I had snapped him nodding off in a chair in the house offered by a Labour Party member to organise the day's activities. It would have made a nice foil to the famous picture of the man he defeated, Brian Coleman, sleeping off his lunch at work at the GLA.

As we went around, I gleaned that Andrew Dismore spent almost every Sunday of his time as MP for Hendon visiting his constituency. "It takes four years to knock on every door," he said. I believe he knows that from first-hand experience.

As we walked around, people in the street stopped to say hello. I hope it doesn't sound rude, but Andrew is not the most recognisable of politicians. If people knew him, it's because they knew him - not because of lurid headlines in a newspaper.

Wherever his main home is, Dismore had - mabye still has - a flat in Burnt Oak.

I don't agree with Dismore on all political questions, not at all, but I believe he was a good MP and will be a very good London Assembly member for Barnet and Camden. One thing we can say for sure is that he will in as short a time as feasible know every inch of his rather large estate.

There is an old saying that the best manure is the farmer's boots, which means, obviously, that the best farmer is the one who has inspected every inch of his land and knows what is going on there. I do believe that Dismore will be the best farmer for Barnet and Camden!

Take me out and shoot me... Or: Brian Coleman: My Part in His Downfall

North Finchley traders representative, Helen Michael

It's a funny thing but, for all all the excitement of yesterday, what is exercising me most this morning is the fact that I missed the chance to take a great picture.

At 6pm I was standing with a friend outside the entrance to Alexandra Palace, at the count for the Barnet and Camden London Assembly member election, when Brian Coleman arrived, with his mother.

It was clear by then that he had lost his London Assembly seat to Andrew Dismore, and people had been speculating on whether or not Coleman would show his face.

Now, here he was, against a spectacular backdrop of all of London, walking towards me. What did I do?

I'll tell you what I did. I failed to take a picture. And I have the audacity to call myself a journalist!

On reflection, it's lucky I didn't. Lucky for me, lucky for Coleman, lucky for everyone. His miserable face was a picture of studied light-heartedness; he was clearly utterly miserable. He lost by 21,000 votes, after all. (Full result here.)

He went into the big hall where the counting took place for the very end of the count; then he stood in the Palm Court while a knackered Nick Walkley, Chief Executive of Barnet Council and its returning officer, read out the result, and then, I understand, sloped off while a justifiably delighted Andrew Dismore made his victory speech. No speech from Coleman. No chance for the rest of us to practise our agreed upon dignified applause.

Yesterday was a great day for me and lots of other Barnet campaigners, trade unionists, anti-cuts activists, and residents who are simply browned off with Coleman. All of these 'constituencies' were represented up at Ally Pally. It was also a great day for the local Labour Party.

After such a day, month, year it would be tempting to write a blogpost along the lines of "Brian Coleman: My Part in His Downfall", casting oneself as Spike Milligan (although much less funny, of course).

If I'd got That Picture yesterday I could have stuck it at the top of this blogpost and written: "Errr, look at me! If nothing else, I'm the one with the camera who whips it out at the right moment." Instead, I'm the one with the camera who forgets all about it at the crucial moment and rather too compassionately steps aside to let a wounded man, not to mention his mother, pass unhassled.

I'm too soft, that's my trouble; it's why I'll never make it in politics. Or journalism.

I'll write some more analysis of the election result soon, and say What I Think Should Happen Next. In the meantime, I hope you like the picture I did put at the top of this blogpost. (I hope Helen Michael doesn't mind it.) It's a hommage to a rather famous picture of Brian Coleman, celebrating his councillor's code of conduct hearing - which he lost, by the way! - against "Barnet Eye" blogger Roger Tichborne.

Helen, a representative of the North Finchley traders who have suffered so much as a result of Barnet council's - in the first place, Brian Coleman's - parking policies, has borne the brunt of Coleman's legendary rudeness recently. She is one of the people who has helped to defeat him in this election and deserves a place of honour.

UPDATE: A few pics from yesterday taken with my crappy compact camera, none of Brian... oh, I told you that already: http://www.flickr.com/photos/11722019@N03/sets/72157629969910817/

To sack Brian, elect Andrew - today's the day!

Today, if they want to take it, the electors of Barnet and Camden have a chance to remove from one of his paid political posts one of the rudest, most arrogant and personally grasping politicians in the UK today - I'm speaking, of course, of Brian Coleman.

There is, in fact, only one way to sack Brian Coleman from the post of London Assembly member for these two boroughs, and that is to elect Andrew Dismore in his place.

Andrew Dismore deserves the job. He was a good constituency MP for Hendon. He will work hard, and he will be on top of his brief.

That he is the Labour candidate might put some people off, but if you lean to the right in politics - how shall I put this? - Andrew is a fairly safe pair of hands! As safe as you are likely to get in the Labour Party (pretty safe, I would say, pretty safe).

Dismore deserves the job, Brian Coleman doesn't deserve the job. This evening the Barnet Press published their interviews with four of the candidates for the post. One candiate was missing. Guess who wouldn't answer the Press's questions? That's right, the incumbent, Brian Coleman.

How predictable, how totally Brian, how completely unacceptable.

Coleman is assuming that he will get a victory, because Labour does need a big swing to take the seat. But it is do-able. If enough people go out and vote.

If you want to do right by Barnet and Camden, if you want to restore some sanity to Barnet and Camden politics, please go and vote for Andrew Dismore today. And, for the love of all that is sane and good, don't vote for Brian Coleman.

The Friday film: Brian Coleman's trembling chins

I enjoyed the Adam Bienkov blogpost today aimed against Conservative GLA member Tony Arbour who thinks that most Londoners don't use public transport. I'm guessing he thinks that public funds shouldn't go towards it, therefore. He asks:

...isn't it a principle of Conservatism and taxation that those... who receive a service are those who should pay for it?

Who do we see in the video stroking his jowls and 'hear hear-ing' at this remark but our own GLA member, Brian Coleman. These films are clearly a source of interest to Barnet (and Camden) residents in the run-up to the GLA election on Thursday 3 May, and, if I remember, I'll post more of them. So that you can see what you're paying for.

Brian Coleman and the red button

Here's a frightening thought. What if Brian Coleman were not to lose his Barnet and Camden seat on the Greater London Authority next May? What if his political career were not stopped in its tracks? What if he were to go higher? It doesn't bear thinking about, does it?

Why, one day he might be put in charge of something seriously important, strategic, something where his mistakes might put people's lives in danger. Er, hang on a minute, he already is: the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority!

P.S. Film quiz points for the name of the film and the character depicted here.

Barnet and Camden

I just finally noticed that the initials B.C. stand both for Brian Coleman and for Barnet and Camden - the GLA constituency for which Coleman is the elected member (argh!).

I am henceforth going to refer to Coleman as Barnet and Camden. I hope he will be voted out in 2012, but I still think it is a good name for B.C., because it has a Cockney rhyming slang ring to it and that would infuriate him. It sums up the not-so-poshness of B.C.

It also reminds me of a sketch by the Two Ronnies, where two cleaning women play tunes on buckets and mops and so on. Half way in is a song called "Camden Town", based on an earlier, much more offensive song called "Chinatown". I love this sketch (and I'm also quite fond of... Camden Town).

Coleman gets the nod

I hear that Brian Coleman got the nod as the Tories' Barnet and Camden candidate for the GLA election in 2012. (A lot could happen between now and then, of course.)

When I heard about the selection meeting, I wondered who the other candidates might be. Genghis Khan, Pol Pot and the Devil, one friend ventured.

I asked some people in the know how these elections are run and they explained that basically people are asked whether they are happy enough with the incumbent and only if they aren't is there a competition to see who will be the candidate.

So representatives from the Tory Party in constituencies currently represented by Coleman were happy enough with him. Blimey! I have observed that there are some people in local politics who, while you know that nominally they are on your own side, it is safest always to point in the direction of the enemy.

P.S. Please sign the petition calling on BoJo to remove BC as chair of the LFEPA: http://www.gopetition.com/petition/40626/sign.html