End of an Era

A few weeks ago, both my parents died within ten days of each other. In time, I will probably write about the last few months of their lives, the issues of dealing with end of life care and the memories they left us with, right up to the end. For now, though, I am just posting the eulogy I wrote for their joint funeral, which my sister and I delivered together.

Freda was born in 1926 in Maidstone, to Albert (aka Gerry) and Frances Oliver. Her mother wanted to call her Geraldine, but the family advised that this would mean she would end up being called Gerry, a boy's name. It's ironic, then, that she was known universally as Fred or Freddie for most of her life. Albert was a Chief Petty Officer in the Royal Navy and was absent for the first few years of her life – she remembered hiding under the kitchen table when this strange man came home – but was able as a 2 year old to answer a neighbour's “Where's your daddy, then?” with: “In the Mediterranean.”

Frank was born in Tonbridge four years later, the son of Henry, a police officer, and Rosa. Within the year they had re-located to Maidstone when Henry was promoted to Sergeant. The family – children Bill (Son), Robert, Frank and Brenda - lived at the Police Headquarters at Wren’s Cross. Sadly, Robert died at the age of 5.

Despite a profound dislike of school Fred was one of the first pupils to attend Maidstone Commercial School (later Maidstone School for Girls/Invicta). She often told the story of the wind carrying her much-hated school hat into the River Medway, only to have someone drag it out and return it to the school. To add insult to injury, she then had to write to thank the man who had rescued it. Much more important to her than school was her dancing, which she had been doing from a very young age.

Frank, meanwhile, gained a scholarship place at Maidstone Grammar School, the passing of which exam he put down to the intervention of WWII. Worried about air raids, his primary school teachers took the children out to the relative safety of the oast houses at East Farleigh, where they crammed past scholarship papers. Anyone who knew Frank and that fierce intelligence he still demonstrated even to his last few days, may suspect he was being (uncharacteristically) modest. It meant, though, that both of us were able to point to the scholarship board at All Saints Primary School and say “That's my dad!”

For Frank, the war years were something of a schoolboy adventure. He always claimed to be Maidstone's first war casualty, as he put it himself a few years ago:

“On the morning of Sunday 3rd September 1939 Neville Chamberlain made a wireless broadcast stating that a state of war now existed. Within a matter of minutes the Air Raid sirens started to sound. At that time I was a rather cherubic choirboy and the strains of the siren came to us through the chords of the organ while I was at choir practice. We were hurried back to the vestry where the vicar dismissed us with the words "we are in a moment of very great danger - I want you to hurry to your homes". I did not need a second telling. I ripped off my surplice and cassock and leapt through the vestry door, tripped over a tombstone and fell headlong on the ground, taking off a large piece of skin from my knee. Because of this I claim to be the first civilian casualty of World War II.”

The family moved to the new Police HQ in Sutton Road in 1940, where the cells were used to house downed German pilots. As Frank's best friend's dad was the overnight jailer, this meant they were able to get autographs. The war was a formative experience, which he recorded in his (as yet) unpublished work “The Second Great War in Pictures by Frank J Hayward, aged 9 3/4” His best friend at this time was Michael Todd; together they got into all sorts of (almost lethal) scrapes, such as electrifying the whole street by putting crocodile clips on a chain-link fence to run electricity out to the garden shed and constructing a diving helmet out of a gas mask which Frank then tested in Loose stream by weighing his pockets down with rocks! Mike, though, was to have a much more important role in his life.

Fred had by this time left school and was working at Royal Insurance. With the war in full swing she found herself taking a more important role than she would have done in peace time, and was soon trusted to produce what her boss called the “Dear Sir, you're not covered” letters. She was also required to fire watch during air raids, although with her legendary ability to leave cigarettes burning in forgotten places, her colleagues often said the office records were more at risk from her than the Luftwaffe. It was at this time she gained the nickname “Incendiary Fred” and where she met a young co-worker called... Mike Todd.

As Frank told Jill (a few days before he died) “I first met Fred in Mote Park in 1946, at a bonfire to celebrate a year after the end of the war” - Mike was the connection and they all remained lifelong friends.

It wasn't all plain sailing, though. Fred was already seeing another young man at the time and in 1947, married Monty Temblett. She was also by this time growing bored with office life. With the war over, and men returning to their old jobs, she found her role diminished so she took the plunge, left a safe job and formed her own dancing school in 1948.

At the same time, Frank was called up for his National Service. Having been Lead Cadet in his ATC Squadron, he became one of the first five national servicemen to be trained as pilots. He trained initially on Tiger Moths, and always retained his love of flying, although he was less impressed with air travel as a passenger. On a work trip to Perth, he once remarked. “That's not flying, it's just like being on a bus.”

Back in civilian life, his career in insurance went hand in hand with his love of entertainment. He helped out with shows put on by the Freda Oliver School of Dancing throughout the 1950s. It was during this period that the infamous “Shooting of Dan McGrew” incident took place. One of the cast, Tony, was reciting this poem as a set piece and told Frank, who was operating the curtains, to listen for the cue to bring them down. It's quite a long poem, and Frank drifted off into a reverie; he was jolted back into action when he suddenly heard the cue. He quickly pulled on the ropes.....

….and Tony launched into the next verse! Not knowing quite what to do, Frank thought “do nothing and the audience won't notice”, so he hung on to the ropes until the end of the piece. It was only afterwards he was told that the curtains had descended just enough to obscure Tony's head, so the last few verses had been delivered by a disembodied voice. This has passed into family legend and makes events such as funerals quite awkward. At Tony's funeral, his brother came up to Fred after the body was committed, held her hand and whispered, “At least Frank wasn't on curtains this time.”

In 1959, Fred and Monty were divorced and in July of that year, she and Frank were married. Their 57th wedding anniversary would have been two days before this funeral, but as they frequently forgot to celebrate it it seems fitting that we were also two days late for it.

Fred and Frank began married life in Brewer Street, but moved shortly afterwards to an upstairs flat at 21 College Road. In December 1962 Jill arrived, in a blizzard, during the second coldest winter of the twentieth century! In 1963, their landlord decided to sell up and offered Frank the whole house. As this included a sizeable front room, which could accommodate a dance studio, they found the money to pay a mortgage, and the rest is history. 

The Hayward family was completed with the addition of Sally in 1965, and from this point on the school became a family affair. In 1966, Fred decided that her pupils had little real outlet for their dancing skills, so she and Frank decided to stage a pantomime, Cinderella, at the town's Municipal Theatre. This was successful and so the following year they formed the Freda Oliver Theatre Group, and provided Maidstone with its pantomime for the next ten years.

In addition to Theatre Group work, Frank also found time to sing with Maidstone Opera Group. He also played Mitch in a production of a Streetcar Named Desire, notable for a press photo which captioned all the cast members' names as John – even the woman in the photo!

Panto scripts were written by both of them (with a fair amount of 'homage' to the Basil Brush Show). Fred's typing – for in those days, multiple scripts meant several sheets of carbon paper and hitting the keys very hard – was legendary. On more than one occasion, Prince Charming declared “...and Cinderella shall be my bridge!”  

Panto took over the entire household from September, when rehearsals started. There was usually a mad dash on Christmas Eve to remove all the costumes from the Living Room so that the family could actually have Christmas. In addition, all four family birthdays fell between the end of December and mid-January – Jill's birthday parties occasionally took place on stage between matinee and evening performances.

When in 1976 Maidstone Borough Council finally woke up to the income-generating possibilities of having a professional panto, the group found itself without a home. Undeterred, Fred and Frank simply re-designed everything and took the show on the road. The Barnstorming Years meant transporting the whole production from one venue to another – village halls, care homes, Medway Little Theatre.

During the 1970s, the Group also put on a series of variety shows and a musical – Cloud 7 – which was conceived, written and performed in the space of 6 weeks when Fred realised she had forgotten to cancel a provisional booking of the Theatre in May 1979. So instead of O level revision, several of the cast were up to their eyes in costumes and rehearsals.

By this time, their children were growing up and doing more. Sally spent many years helping with the running of the school, taking classes, sorting costumes and performing, in addition to college and eventually starting her own school in Sittingbourne. Jill moved from stage to orchestra pit in later years before leaving Maidstone for university.

In 1992, with Frank's retirement from General Accident (something he had been counting down to for about 10 years!), they put on their final pantomime, closed the school after over 40 years and their thoughts turned to moving to Devon, site of our family holidays and somewhere they had always wanted to live. And so, in 1993, they cleared College Road of costumes, pantomime horses, cows, camels, and other assorted momentos of 30 years' residence, packed them up and (as we later discovered) transported much of it with them across country! The garden shed contains the entrance of an Eygyptian tomb painted on hardboard and a lion's head.

Once in Sidmouth, they again threw themselves into local life. Fred joined her local WI branch, serving a term as President; Frank stood for election to public office and served a term as an independent councillor on Sidmouth Town Council. They also enjoyed many a summer evening in Connaught Gardens listening to the town band, as well as seeking out the best local pubs. They were also active members of East Devon Conservative Association, canvassing and advertising cream teas.

In 1998, they became grandparents. Frank threw himself wholeheartedly into this new role, pulling faces and generally being silly. He was also M's greatest defender, always righteously indignant on her behalf and scathing in his opinion of the educational establishment's inability to deal with her autism. 

Fred and Frank also joined the Sidmouth Songsters, Frank singing and Fred turning pages for the accompanist. They also assisted in putting programmes of songs together and Frank spent many a happy hour printing out sheets of music. One of the grandchildren's fondest memories is of when Grandpa (then approaching 80) jumped off the stage during a rendition of Flanders and Swann's “The Hippopotamus Song”, although others questioned the wisdom of this!

The Songsters raised thousands of pounds for local charities and it was only in 2012, when they and other members felt they were getting a bit too old for it, did they finally retire from entertainment. As Frank said to Jill a few days before he died, “All my life, from the time I was a choirboy, I have been entertaining people.” This is so true of both of them.

Frank was diagnosed with cancer in February of this year. He accepted it with equanimity and, true to form, set to organising his affairs. I made as many trips as possible down from Manchester and Frank was delighted that he was able to buy M her first pint at the Conservative Club (and even more delighted when she bought him one in return!). Happily, the family were able to get Fred and Frank down to the Club one last time in April.

In mid-June, quite unexpectedly, Fred was admitted to the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital with a chest infection and sadly died the following day. Frank was, by this time at Sidmouth Community Hospital, where he died 10 days later, with us by his side.

Reading the tributes of old pupils and friends on social media and compiling this eulogy has made us all appreciate quite how significant an influence they were on a generation of young people in Maidstone. Some have themselves pursued careers in entertainment as a result. Fred was a major figure in the town and Frank was a loyal consort, never complaining when he was mistakenly called Mr Oliver. How fitting it is that these two great entertainers, who had known each other for 70 years, should be leaving us in the way they would have wanted – as a double act.

RIP

Sometimes it's Hard to be a Woman...

Well, it is in the Labour Party, at any rate.

I warn you not to be vocal

I warn you not to be working class

I warn you not to rock the boat


I'm beginning to think the Labour Party (and wider movement) really isn't a good place for women. For all its window dressing about equality, it's sadly lacking in a lot of respects. From the low-grade stuff (referring to two middle-aged women Vice Chairs of a branch as "the Vice Girls"; the routine lack of eye contact and engagement from some groups) to outright rudeness and intimidation. And then there's the tolerance of sexual impropriety (see previous blog) which, in the light of serious CSE cases, is very worrying indeed. 

From the young turks who think they know it all to the "creepy*" older hands, there's always an opportunity to be looked down on, marginalised and (in extreme cases) smeared. Challenge this, though, and you are labelled a troublemaker.

Of course, there are the proper channels to go through if you are in dispute. You can put in a formal complaint. You can wait a year and have no response. Your enquiries can go unanswered. Democracy in (in)Action.

And then there's the Women's Groups. Eternal forums for discussion but essentially just divisive and separatist.

Loyalty, it seems, is only a one way street, with members (especially women members) expected to shut up and do as they're told. 

It seems to me that "inclusion" in the Labour Party is about as meaningless as it is in education - in reality, it is integration - you do it our way or not at all - rather than true inclusion.

The fact that your least worst option in British politics is this sorry state of affairs is profoundly depressing.





*not my description, but it says a lot about perceptions of new members

A Menopausal Malcontent Sounds Off.

This may turn out to be several posts in one. I think I've just had enough.

For the Good of the Party 

All those years the Left kept quiet in the name of party unity. How rash of us to believe that the same would apply now that the Right (sorry, "Moderate") wing of the party is no longer in the ascendant. 

It was fine during the leadership campaign - voice whatever opinion you like in support of your candidate (up to and including "That Corbyn bloke will be a disaster" and so on) but we have a result now - a decisive one, with the biggest democratic mandate in the history of the party - and the fact that you don't like the result does not give you the right to spout off about the leader and brand those of us who supported/voted for him as "a rabble", Trots, and a whole lot worse. 

And yet we have MPs and front benchers who spend their days slagging off the leadership, and are then astonished to get the sack. Rentaquote "feisty" types who "won't shut up" or others who whinge incessantly and then flounce out of the party. Yesterday's men (the same ones who drove so many from the party over the last 25 years) pontificating ad nauseam in the press to any journalist who'll listen (and that's most of them - easier than seeking out alternative narratives beyond London and the South East).

And then there are local councillors who see their assured future careers as MPs (via the Progress finishing school) suddenly receding into the distance, and have spent the last few months snarking about the leadership like the group of self-declared "cool kids" in the playground, and who then suddenly turn up with their own pressure group, Open Labour, which arrived in a blaze of glory a few weeks ago and then....... 

As social media groups like 50+Corbyn Supporters show, "Corbynistas" aren't all young, naive or SWP entryists; they are ordinary folk who are old enough to remember what life was like in the 80s/90s under the last lot of Tories and, more importantly, what life was like before that - when we had the Britain of Compassion and Public Ownership. You remember? The one where we weren't "intensely relaxed" about inequality, and where we didn't believe that outsourcing public services to large private BPO companies was the answer to everything. These are the people who are flocking back to Labour, along with the young who have never had the fortune to experience life without triangulating consensus of Thatcherism and New Labour.

And yet some of the PLP and some councillors, far from being chastened by the rejection of their uniformly lacklustre leadership candidates, have seen fit to try and trash both the leader and the 59.5% of party members who voted for him. Not for them acceptance of a democratic mandate. Not for them keeping their opinions to themselves for the good of the party.No. They are Important People and their opinions MUST BE HEARD. In public. All the time.

For years it was those of us on the Left who were urged to keep our misgivings to ourselves, to "not wash our dirty linen in public", etc, etc. We did. And do you know what? It allowed all kinds of unacceptable behaviour to continue which should have been challenged openly. 

The manipulation of candidate selection to ensure preferred candidates were selected over the wishes of local members, branches and CLPs, resulting in candidates being foisted on members and activists, and whispering campaigns to undermine those who had the temerity to object. The disdain with which the party hierarchy treats its members is quite staggering in some places. 

The reluctance to challenge wrongdoing for fear of causing cultural offence has led to powerful blocs within the Labour Party whose values run counter to those the majority of members hold.

Silencing voice of the membership within the party in the name of electability (which continued long after that electability faded) resulted in focus-group/ opinion poll/core vote strategies which took no notice of what was happening in real life (and which activists could have told them if they'd bothered to ask). For a Democratic Socialist party, we became pretty undemocratic and not the least bit socialist, defending policies of which we should have been ashamed.

My Enemy's Enemy (isn't Necessarily my Friend)

Sadly, bad behaviour is endemic. It's not just the so-called Moderates, either, although their sense of entitlement is almost as breathtaking as the Tories. To be honest, though, elements of the Left are just as bad. The upsurge of support, activism and enthusiasm which made Corbyn's election campaign so exciting has rapidly descended into nasty little power games. Just as much of the PLP sees members and activists as unimportant foot soldiers, so a few self-appointed "leaders" of Corbyn-supporting groups are busy carving out niches for themselves, ignoring the voices of the thousands who signed up in the summer. And the dirty tricks have started; goading (I won't call it bullying - yet), undermining other groups, tampering with social media accounts. More like the SWP than the Labour Party. Some of the comrades are being decidedly un-comradely at the moment.

Which brings me on to....

Rum, Misogyny and the Lash

Labour has a woman problem. Not just whether or not they hold the highest "offices of state" or whether they make up 50% of the shadow cabinet (which they now do), but the way in which the party treats women. Yes, we have All-Women Shortlists, but these can also be used to manipulate candidate selection to exclude good local male candidates when it suits. Low level misogyny is never very far from the surface, and attitudes among some male members of the party are pretty neanderthal. When a number of women members go through the correct procedure (independently) to complain about the same party official, their case drags on for over a year and their polite enquiries as to progress are not even acknowledged. Similarly, there were a distressing number of male party members who were unconcerned about Simon Danczuk's actions simply because the girl concerned was over the age of consent. Again, more like the SWP than the Labour Party.

This is not to say that all the men in the Labour Party behave poorly; there are some fine, honourable comrades with whom I'm proud to be associated. There are also, however, a sizeable number who appear to think that women's voices don't count for much ("who are these people?") and they certainly don't like women who stand up to them! I thought we'd moved on from Stokely Carmichael's view about the place of women in political movements, but there you go. 

I've stayed very quiet about a number of things which make me unhappy about the Labour Party at the moment. Yes, the right of the party and their reluctance to accept that life and the British people have moved on from the heady days of New Labour is infuriating, but I had so much hope that things would be different under Corbyn. He still has the right message, but he needs to stop listening to the siren call of those who see his leadership as their shortcut to greatness. As with Ed, when Corbyn is being his own man he is engaging, intelligent and with all the right messages. He just has to put the party in order. Sadly, though, there is a group of men/boys lurking in the shadows of the broad church, playing silly games while Britons suffer.

Somebody's Daughter

I'm so disheartened at the number of men in the Labour Party who consider the age of consent to be the sole determinant of wrongdoing. 

A child (for, in the eyes of the law, she is still that) of 17; a 49 year old Member of Parliament. Does that not strike anyone as inappropriate? It would have been pretty sleazy even if they had been the same age - that she's a minor makes it even more inappropriate. She asked about a job; he offered dubious sexual remarks as a reply.

And apart from anything else, he is a Member of Parliament - you know; one of those "people of good standing in the community" who can vouch for us mere mortals on passport applications, etc. Is this really the kind of person you want to confirm that you are of good character? I don't.

And yet, a number of male party members have today bravely stood up to say "I don't see what the problem is."

Which is exactly what the problem is.

We are the Labour Party - we should be better than this.

Today's Tories: Generation Not-a-Clue

Cameron's going to turn us into Generation Buy, is he?

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/how-much-you-need-earn-6587292

When I was young and foolish (20), I took out my first mortgage - £11,000 for a studio flat. Two years later, we sold it for £15,000, and thought we'd done pretty well. A few years later, the late 80's Yuppie boom saw the same flats going for around £40,000 (they were close to the railway line to London). Quite a price for a 12' x 24' room with a kitchenette in one corner and a bathroom.

(They now go for £70-80,000)

When we took out our current £47,500 mortgage in 1993, I was a Scale 4 Admin Officer and my partner was a Clerical Officer, both working for a city council. Our combined income would probably have been in the mid-£20,000s at most. It was a bit of a stretch financially, but it was still cheaper than renting, thanks to MIRAS, etc. Of course, tax subsidies for mortgage payments were phased out, but we could still just about keep our heads above water.

Just before the crash in 2007 we had, through the "hard work" that Cameron and his ilk set so much store by, reached the heady heights of Senior/Principal Officer level, with a household income of around £52,000. Yippee!

Except that in that time, house price inflation had boosted the value of our house to around £250,000, so we couldn't have afforded to buy the house we were already living in, despite decent salaries.

Then came my outsourcing (a combination of New Labour government and council actions) and subsequent severance (from Capita - a merciful release), followed by my partner's departure from MCC thanks to coalition cuts. I'm now back at work (on a little under £16,000 a year), and he's surviving on £60 a week Carers Allowance (with no time off or outside support), and our house is now worth around £180,000. Again, we could not afford to buy the house we live in. And in today's inflated market, renting would also be beyond us.

So, Mr Cameron:

1) Do you realise how little most people actually earn in this country? The "average" of £26,500 is a pipe dream for most of us (I only earned at or above that for about 4 of my 22 years' local government service)

2) Do you remember the Blessed Margaret's devotion to home ownership, which resulted in profligate lending and rampant price-inflation? Boosted by that wheeze of selling off council houses as loss-leaders that brought the whole thing crashing down in the early 90's (which was how we picked up a decent 3 bedroom house for £50,000). If it was unsustainable when prices still bore some relation to reality, how's it going to work this time?

You can only be "Generation Buy" if you have secure employment and sufficient income to meet your lovely new mortgage. Nothing your government has done in 5 years has made anyone's employment more secure, and despite what we're told by the media, I know no-one who's had a salary increase in years.

Oh, and if you're under 25, forget home ownership - you're simply "not productive enough" to earn enough to take out a mortgage!

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/10/06/matthew-hancock-living-minimum-wage_n_8252008.html?utm_hp_ref=uk

Don't Risk Your Future with Labour? It's Not Much of a Risk, Dave.

Here's a thing. Listening to Chicken "Pumped Up" Dave the other day warning me how much worse off I'd be entrusting the economy and my livelihood to Labour, it occurred to me that I'm not, and never have been, better off under the Tories.

I left school in 1981, in the middle of a recession. It took months to find a job, despite my dad nagging me every day about going to the Job Centre. I got lucky in the November of that year - I landed a temporary job as a Library Assistant (Scale1) on the massive salary of £3,945 per annum!

Unfortunately for me, after 6 months, the woman whose maternity leave I was covering returned to work, so I faced a return to the dole queue. Fortunately, the Kent County Library Service seemed to like me, and were able to offer me another temporary post in another library, along with another girl whose fiance was in the Falklands. At the end of our 6 month contract, they had to let one of us go, and chose the other girl (even though she and I knew she was off to wherever the fiance was going to be posted on his return from the South Atlantic). So, back to the Job Centre...

Then, a couple of weeks later, they contacted me to say Jane had left, and would I consider coming back? I asked mum what I should do (I was only 19!). Her advice was "if you say yes, they'll always just kick you around whenever they feel like it" so I turned them down. A few months later I was again working for the Library Service, this time as a Cataloguing Assistant, repairing and processing books, and then, a couple of weeks short of my 20th birthday I got a proper, permanent job as a Scale 1 Clerical Assistant with the local education office.

From this point on, local government became my career (apart from the 4 year break I took to go back into full time education to get the degree I had no interest in at 18). By this time, I had managed to work my way up to the heady heights of a Scale 3 Admin Assistant, and a lot of people thought I was mad to give up a steady job to go to uni. But with no ties, it seemed like the best chance I would have, and I was right. I loved my course, I spent a year studying overseas, I met my partner, I made good friends who are now my kids' godparents - it was all good stuff.

I graduated in 1991.... in the middle of another Tory recession! Jobs were scarce, so instead of the graduate-level job I'd been hoping for, I settled for a Scale 4 Admin Officer post with Manchester City Council, working with the Advisory/Training team for the new National Curriculum. The work was interesting, and the team were great, but in terms of career progression it was stagnation. The body clock kicked in and in 1998, our first child was born. Despite her diagnosis of Sturge Weber Syndrome and epilepsy, I was able to return to full time work after my 6 months' maternity leave, and almost immediately found that there was finally an opportunity for promotion. Some advised against going for it, thinking it would be too much to cope with in addition to a new baby (and a disabled one at that!), but with the stunning support of my bosses, together with a brilliant, council-run nursery (later part of the Sure Start programme), I was able to "have it all" as the Daily Mail loves to put it.

So I found myself in a Senior Officer post (don't get too excited, it was still well short of the Average National Salary). A couple of years, and another child, later, I was redeployed into a team working on the development of the Adult Learning Grant, part of the last Labour government's Skills Strategy (A 'strategy'! When was the last time a government had one of those, eh?). I started out as a operational team leader, moving on to become Deputy and then (Acting) Scheme Leader. And then it all went a bit pear-shaped...

This, remember, was New Labour whose belief in outsourcing was every bit as evangelical as the Coalition's. In their infinite wisdom, they decided to group ALG with EMA and a bunch of other grants into a massive Learner Support contract. This meant that it was too big a scheme for the council to bid for, so the entire team (some 50 people) ended up TUPE'd to the private sector. For a while I carried on as before, but when the inevitable 'restructure' came, I was demoted and de-skilled and thoroughly miserable, as the project I'd spent 4 years of my life developing was changed beyond all recognition. Eventually, the contractor and I parted company by mutual agreement (they didn't need me and I hated working for them!), and I received a reasonable severance package which allowed me to take a year off (as I thought) to settle my daughter into her (mainstream) high school. And so I became a full-time carer. Paid around £3000 a year for a more-than-full-time, high stress 'job', caring for a traumatised autistic teenager. (see other blog posts for more details). Our household income halved, but my partner had been quietly plugging away at a local government career, too. Nothing flashy, but he was hard-working, conscientious and damned good at his job. so we managed. Money was tight, but we were OK - just. 

One year turned into two, three... she never really settled in mainstream and crashed out fairly spectacularly in Year 9, with six months out of school while a suitable place was found (it took an intervention by Sir Gerald Kaufman to get that sorted, so guess where my vote's going?). 

And then the killer.... the bloody Coalition and its Austerity-for-Some meant some of the harshest cuts in the country for Manchester. He avoided the first round of redundancies, but when the second round came up, he took voluntary severance (on the not unreasonable grounds that next time it might be compulsory, with a much worse financial deal). So that was it. 37 years' combined service, and both our careers over before we hit 50. 

I had been looking for a job since we realised our only income was under threat. Despite my experience there was very little about. I got interviews, but no success ("You have lots of experience, but it's more 'management' than this post needs" was one bit of feedback!). Finally, I got one! Almost full-time (30hpw); an Admin Officer. On a fte rate which was pretty much where I had left off when I went to university nearly 30 years ago. In the first 9 months I didn't earn enough to start paying tax (I'm supposed to thank Nick Clegg for that, right?). Don't get me wrong - I love the work; it's worthwhile, and I'm working with awe-inspiring people who are really knowledgeable, empathetic and effective, but the fact remains I have pretty much nothing to show for a nearly-30 year career. 

Resentful? You bet! And I'm not the only one. I know so many people in the same position. "Working People", "Hard-Working Families", whatever they're being called this week. Except many of them either aren't working because of the Coalition's public sector cuts, or are finding themselves in severely reduced circumstances (and we're not taking Daily Mail-style 'reduced circumstances, where Jacinta has had to give up her second pony and they've had to send the kids to a STATE SCHOOL!!!!). In all my years working for a local authority, I only earned at or above the average salary for about three years. 

So all in all, you can see why I'm not taken in by the Bullingdon Boys and their scare stories. Any government which has to promise to legislate so that it can't break its own taxation pledges really doesn't deserve our vote.

Labour isn't perfect (I'm still worried about their stance on social security and immigration), but faced with the alternative - a dog-eat-dog future with no civil society - I know where my vote's going in the General Election.

Here's a handy graph showing what my income has done over the course of my working life. Note the years where there was a Conservative government, and where a Labour one....

Thoughts on the Hustings...

My first thought is: "Great! We have hustings, and they're well-attended."

One of the great things about Levenshulme is how engaged its residents are. We might disagree, squabble, snark and sneer, but ultimately we all love where we live, are proud of it and will defend it when outsiders look down on us. We go out on the streets, we campaign loudly and effectively and we speak up when we think something's wrong. So where other areas fail to engage voters in the electoral process (especially at local level), we have hustings, organised by the Levenshulme Community Association, which packed out one of the few secular meeting spaces in the area (that, in itself, is an issue) on a warm spring night when people could have simply stayed at home enjoying the weather. Thanks are due to the LCA for organising it, and to the Klondyke for being excellent hosts.

Many of us already knew each other socially; others, I suspect, will have been putting faces to names from social media pages. Some of us are overtly political, others defiantly non-aligned. The evening was designed to allow us to get to know the candidates who seek to represent us on Manchester City Council from next month, with written questions and some from the floor, addressed to all candidates in turn. We have five candidates, UKIP perhaps wisely recognising that they stand little chance in an inclusive multicultural area such as ours. 

The Conservative candidate was a no-show - pretty disgraceful, as the (admittedly few) Tory voters in the area deserve to be represented, just as the other parties were. To be fair, he did have a bit further to travel, I suppose - from a street just over the border in the Gorton South ward.  It seems that like their leader, though, Conservative candidates don't feel the need to turn up to debates.

The LibDem candidate was the veteran former councillor John Commons, eager to distance himself from his party, and emphasising his credentials as a longstanding Leve resident and activist. He gave a barnstorming performance (aided by knowing pretty much everyone in the room, residents and 'visitors'), and it will remain to be seen whether he can distance himself from his party sufficiently to win back the seat he lost a few years back.

The Trades Union and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) candidate was Fiona Higgins, a Leve resident and care worker who spoke with passion and integrity from a position of having experienced the effects of austerity cuts and zero hours contracts in the care sector. 

The Labour Party's candidate was Basat Sheikh, the owner of a care company (the only candidate present not to live in the ward). He was loudly supported by (as John Commons pointed out) a sizable number of Labour councillors and assorted supporters, who were both very vocal and combatative (one criticised the chairing of the meeting, another heckled and interrupted while others were speaking). The enthusiasm for Mr Sheikh appeared to be confined to this section of the room, though, and it begs a question as to why it was felt he needed so much partisan support, including a question from the floor from his campaign manager? 

Things got particularly tetchy around the issue of zero hours contracts (the widespread use of which the Labour Party has committed to ban), when he was tackled on whether his care company does (or did) offer such contracts to staff. He stated that he does not, and has never done so, a statement which was queried by several of those present, including one voter who had a copy of a letter which seemed to indicate otherwise.

The final candidate was Dick Venes of the Green Party, who also stood in 2014. Sadly, although I recently scored 97% Green on one of those 'Which party are you most aligned with?" quizzes (a bit embarrassing for a Labour Party member and former branch official*), I find, 24 hours on, that I can't recall any of his answers in any detail. I have the same problem with the Foo Fighters...

There were a range of questions on local issues, and most of the candidates acquitted themselves well on them. I'm sorry to say that 'my' candidate was severely underwhelming. Not having even an estimated completion date for the new leisure centre (possibly the biggest issue in the area over the last year or so), suggesting an Eric Pickles-style 'grace period' for those parking on yellow lines, telling us that he wants to make Leve "the kind of place you move to because you want to, rather than because you can't afford Chorlton or Didsbury" (which was met with a concerted response that many of us already ARE here because we want to be, and have no desire to live in Chorlton or Didsbury). He then compounded this by telling us that it really doesn't matter if the candidate lives in the ward (Yes, it does!) and telling us that "Sir Gerald Kaufman doesn't live in Levenshulme." It had to be pointed out to him that Sir G. might not live in Leve, but does live in the constituency he serves! So, factually irrelevant and very disrespectful to a much-admired MP who has served this community with great distinction for 45 years. It was not a high point.

All in all, it was a good evening but I have to say that, with a few notable exceptions, the clacque of Labour politicians present was a bit of an embarrassment. Do they consider their candidate so weak that he needs the support of so many councillors from other wards? Where were the Levenshulme Labour members who selected him for the candidacy**?

As I've said, Leve residents are intelligent, committed and engaged. We don't take well to being talked down to by someone who'd barely set foot in the ward before last year, or being told our area is a second choice stepping-stone to Hipsterville. We want to know who our candidates are and what their values are, which is why we turned out in pleasing numbers last night.

I will be voting again for Sir Gerald Kaufman on 7 May, but the local elections are another matter.



*that's a whole other blogpost....
** and that's another....

[Full disclosure: I was one of the unsuccessful nominees for the Levenshulme candidacy. If anyone would like to see my candidate statement, I'll happily post it and folk can judge for themselves whether the best man won.]