The Jury Team

Since I started this blog a couple of people have mentioned The Jury Team to me as an example of what I was trying to achieve. So I’ve been over to the website and had a look at what they might be about.

The first thing to notice is that they’ve got things moving very quickly – formed in March 2009 and they had candidates standing in the European Elections. That’s good going and hugely impressive.

However, from what I’ve seen I’m not convinced that the concept is the same. It seems to be more like a political party, just not an established one, than I envisage. The other thing is that they don’t seem to have updated much since the European Elections – although to be fair, the work they must have put in in advance, they deserve a good long sleep for a couple of weeks!

Anyway, I’ve got in touch with them and hope to meet up soon to see if we can join forces and work together.

“Only one of the candidates lived in the constituency”

I heard that comment on the radio this morning as I caught about five minutes of a 5Live show asking people why they voted for the BNP in the recent European Elections.

The thing that surprised me the most about it all was the fact that people were phoning the station to admit voting for the BNP. Of the two or three people I heard before I had to turn the radio off, the mood was one of, ‘we’re not proud of it, but it was a protest vote. And I’m not racist, but maybe they’ve got a point that immigration has gone a bit too far’.

And then I heard this quote from a guy in Wales – “Only one of the candidates lived in the constituency”.

I think he was describing the last general election and not the European Elections, but it was used as a way to explain how traditional party politics has lost its way representing ordinary folk. He didn’t know who to vote for as they were all career politicians from outside the area who knew nothing of the issues facing local people. And he has a point.

It’s still a poor excuse to vote for the BNP …