The Rock Blog

The video footage from the Tooting hustings is now online.

You can watch my performance here.

On Monday night I travelled up to Nottingham for the final hustings of the election. I feel hustings are a crucial part of the election process, and that is why I am the only Chairman candidate to have attended all the hustings.

The night went well, although I had no-one to directly compete with! We had two local PPC’s attend, Anna Soubry & Stephen Mold, which is always a good sign that CF is beginning to be recognised again.

With two excellent universtites in the area, Nottingham is a great place to build strong allegiances with fellow Conservatives and I think all the executive members over the past few years deserve credit. Patrick Sullivan obviously has a tremendous reputation in the area and was publicly supported by both Edward Keene and Hamish Stewart.

My badges were readily accepted by the audience so I think I must have done well enough!

I went to the Manchester Hustings on Friday, as did all the independent candidates. I cadged a lift with the Keele CF, who made up the majority of the audience. There was a surprising low turnout locally but David Bonner and Alex Law came down from Lancaster to bolster the numbers.

I thought I performed well and am looking forward to the Nottingham hustings, which will be the last of this election trail.

We went on for a curry after and headed home well debated and fed! It was good to hear that Manchester has an abundance of young councillors and some supportive associations.

I am heading back up north this weekend - visiting more branches & speaking at other hustings. I feel it is key to visit as many branches, and meet as many members as possible - see my map for where I have been so far!

I include below where I will be over the coming days - do come along and meet me if you can!

Friday - Manchester hustings
Saturday - Manchester & York
Sunday - Leeds
Monday - Nottingham hustings
Tuesday - Newcastle Upon Tyne

UPDATE: so far I have been to Newcastle, Hereford, Cheltenham, Bristol, Edinburgh, Blackpool, Lewes, Bournemouth, UCL, Kings, LSE, Imperial, Cities of London & Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea, Lancaster, Essex, Cambridge, Newcastle & Keele, Croydon, Tooting, Dudley, Birmingham, Stafford, Brentford & Isleworth, Harrow, Richmond, Watford, Kent, Manchester & Norwich. 

After the last two hustings, it was hard to know what to expect: a respectful, attentive audience or a vocal, partisan audience. I think it was arguably a combination of both!

All the NME candidates were none affiliated and independent. Owen was his usual calm, collected self; Matt was honest, bright and earnest; Steve was passionate, heartfelt and British(!); Anastasia was brave, open and natural.

I think that Patrick Sullivan deserves a paragraph all to himself. I am sure many hundreds of Conservatives know Patrick. He has friends across the spectrum of the Party and CF and no doubt beyond. The speech Patrick gave tonight was possibly the bravest speech I have seen by an individual, young politician in my life. Patrick demonstrated everything I believe about internal politics: we should focus on the positives and not the negatives, we should aim higher,we should be better.

I have had tremendously positive feedback about my performance. As one person put it ‘a striking return to form’! I am happy that I can deliver my message and not only be complimented by my supporters but by people with commitments to other camps.

The evening had a positive, progressive tone that did all the candidates proud.

I’m becoming worryingly familiar with certain areas of Tooting! Another day leafletting was followed by the second hustings of the campaign trail.

Suffice to say the atmosphere for the hustings was somewhat ‘different’ form Bristol, which accounted for my less than perfect performance. I was actually disappointed by the behaviour of some individuals but, this being politics, I should have expected it.

More people contacted me to compliment on my performance than they did at Bristol. Apparently, I performed exceptionally well, under the circumstances. Onwards and upwards!