Conservatives win a seat at Shirebrook Town Council!!!

The shortest summary of the just-concluded local elections can be encapsulated in one sentence: another humiliating, landslide defeat for the Labour Party. More than 300 seats lost, 8 council majority lost, MP in Hartlepool lost. The working class finally awakes from lethargy and day by day increasingly rejecting the false propaganda of the Labour Party. So-called “Red Wall” crumbling down all over North. I could write a whole article about it, but I suspect I wouldn’t write anything we haven’t read in the mass media anyway. So we will focus on analysing the elections in Shirebrook and our district.

The shortest summary of the just-concluded local elections in Shirebrook and Bolsover District can be encapsulated in one sentence: another humiliating, landslide defeat for the Labour Pa… naaah. It’s not that bad for Labour in Shirebrook. Let’s start with County Council.

DERBYSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL

At this point, we can say that Derbyshire is solid blue. 45 seats at County Hall with only 14 Labour means that Conservatives can finally go ahead with their policies without looking around their shoulder. People liked the last 4 years and want more of it.

BOLSOVER DISTRICT

In 2017 Labour Party won all of 6 seats in Bolsover District. In 2021 they lost half of them. Can we call it landslide loss? You decide. Bolsover councillors now stand for 21% of all Labour firepower at County Hall.

SHIREBROOK

This election was closest to my heart- not only I live in Shirebrook for almost a decade but I run personally in this election. I admit- from the start I knew it will be almost impossible to win so I focused on by-election for Town Council. I run a campaign only in South Ward so I still see the result as a success. Why? In the 2017 election, Labour gained 1222 votes compared to 1303 this time around. That is 81 more. In the 2017 election, Conservative candidate got 430 compared to 770 this time around. That is 340 more. For an unknown candidate without a campaign in 2/3 of the contested area- not a bad result. I do not doubt that the fight will be even fiercer in the next election. The Conservatives are picking up steam and if they put up someone more established at the next election then it may well be that even Shirebrook is no longer safe for Labour.

SHIREBROOK SOUTH BY-ELECTION

I knocked on doors, sent letters and dropped leaflets. When I decided to run for Council seat at Conservative ticket for the first time in 2019, one of the residents told me that I have more chances to win a jackpot in Euromillions than a seat at STC. I think I should start buying lotto tickets… One more fact worth mentioning is a growth of voter participation by 2%. We are waaaay far from leading wards in District but 2% growth is good.

CAMPAIGN SUMMARY

As usual- when you look closer at Shirebrook Labour- they made so many mistakes, bad decisions and mismanaged their effort. At the end of day they fought without heart and passion. Same. Old. Labour. They just concluded that Shirebrook is “theirs” and they don’t have to do much. As usual- they took Shirebrook for granted.

I admit- I made some mistakes as well. The first and biggest one was the lack of a campaign on the Internet. No Facebook ads, no Google ads, no activity on my FB profile. The second mistake was not including “election imprint” on my blog. I started it in 2019 and I never published anything remotely reminding “election material” yet someone complained to the electoral team at BDC claiming it is election material. Lesson learned- I will use my blog and FB fan page in the next election. If people from the “other side” force me to use my blog in a campaign, I think I should do it in a planned and managed fashion. 

The biggest surprise of this election for me was Labour’s failure to put up two candidates in the Town Council by-election. I don’t know who runs things there- but clearly, someone dropped the ball or… it was deliberate tactics to split the vote of those who know what Labour stand for. Some of those people do not like Labour as well as Conservatives so fielding Independent candidate should not harm them anyway but will harm Conservatives, who need every vote there is in hope for a seat. So Labour fielded one candidate officially under the Labour banner and one in a very sneaky way- as an independent candidate.

How do I know that Pamela Brown benefited from “covert” Labour Party support? Few reasons. First: I was at The Arc and I stand very close to Labour while votes were counted. I heard what they are talking about and how they behave. For me, Pamela Brown wasn’t Independent. Second- her election leaflet looks like a Labour Party leaflet with only one difference- no Labour Party logo. Everything else was like Labour leaflet- design, size, quality of paper and… printer. It was not a coincidence. Looks like residents of Shirebrook does not like this kind of tricks and political play. Pamela Brown lost badly and for the first time in decades (or ever? I can’t find any Tory success in Shirebrook in Internet archives), Shirebrook Labour Party will have legitimate opposition in Council Chamber. If you liked my work on S247 so far- now I will have even more fresh information to publish (if STC decides to meet- 2 meetings in whole 2021? Yeah, they work hard, right?)

I have no doubt that I was lucky to win the seat. I fought as hard as I can, and yet I only got 60 votes more than in 2019. This time it was enough, but to be honest I was hoping for more. Now it’s all in my hands to prove to those who stayed home that one Conservative is worth more than ten Socialists. I sincerely hope that my success will inspire more Shirebrook residents to join me and engage in activities to change the style of town governance.

I would like to express my deepest thanks to everyone who participated in the election and voted for me. I will not fail your trust and to prove it, I already started to do something to fulfil my election promises. I even wrote and published an article about it but later on, I decided to delete it and publish it again when I finish my project- so stay tuned! It’s just too early to write about details. 

Meanwhile, I invite all residents to send me an invitation on Facebook – as promised during the elections: I will inform you about interesting matters regarding the town through my Facebook profile as well as this blog. Here is the link to my profile:

https://www.facebook.com/sylwester.zwierzynski.710

Sylwester Zwierzynski info@shirebrook247.com