A new life

Labour of Love

By Simon Buckley

There are few scarier moments in life than the first time you leave hospital, clutching a new born child in your inexperienced arms. You want so much to do a perfect job and the sense of responsibility is breathtaking. And yet all you have to rely on is instinct, some books by Super Nanny, and a few things your parents taught you. When I’d been selected as a candidate for next year’s local elections I was reminded me of the feelings I had 22 years ago, standing outside the maternity unit holding my daughter, watching the mid-wife scuttle away as hastily as George Osborne when the latest GDP figures are released.

When a baby wants something it cries, and it takes weeks, perhaps months, to decipher the meaning of the various pleas for help. A gentle sob might indicate the infant simply wants gentle attention, whilst certain high pitched yells have you charging barefooted across broken glass. In a council ward, there’s not one voice, but several thousand, all vying to make themselves heard, for a myriad assorted reasons. Trying to discern the needs of all those individuals, as I studied the statistics from the official profile, was no easier than trying to decode the differing calls of a child.

Like a real life Monopoly board, the district where I’m to begin my work is an area of extremes. It has roads that shelter the wealthy and streets that hold the impoverished. Some residents have a choice of car to use each day, others are governed by the adequacy of the hourly bus service. One school need never worry where its next meal ticket is coming from, another issues free dinners to nearly half its pupils. Whether rich or poor, young or old, all have reason to call upon a councillor, and all will hope that action will be taken to bring security and comfort to their lives.

One evening, as dusk was falling, I toured the long avenues and zig-zag thoroughfares that make up the ward. There were so many people to meet and listen to, the task before me felt overwhelming. And so, when I came home, I picked up the phone and called someone who’d seen it all before, just like a new parent would when they required advice.

The phone rang 3 times before it was answered. “Hello, have you got a moment” I said. There was a pause at the other end of the phone. “Yes, of course. This is a take-away. What would you like to order?”. I quickly hung up on the Kathmandu and rang Kate, who was next on my contact list and the person I was trusting to guide me through the coming months. Kate was going to be my agent. At least she would be when I actually bothered to formerly ask her, as she patiently pointed out. That’s the reassuring thing about Kate, everything has to be done properly.

Over the next hour her soothing, knowledgeable tones helped me to focus, and so the next thing I did was to invite 2 mates, Pete and Jonathan down to the pub. I felt like a press gang officer recruiting for Nelson’s navy as, with the help of hard liquor, I encouraged them to join me on my campaign. I was even ready to offer them fancy titles but, to their credit, they didn’t need bribing. Pete was a teenager in the 80s and, like me, remembered the last time The Tories had trashed the country with the verve of the Bullingdon Club on a night out. My friends were ready for the contest.

With my team now in place, I went to meet the other candidates. We gathered at the town hall, as perky as kittens on cat nip, in a room so dull it could only have been chosen with the knowledge that we’d need sedating. The leader of the Labour Group, like a grammar school head, welcomed us all and began a discussion on policy. He didn’t get a chance to speak again for another half an hour. The “make the environment as boring as possible” tactic had clearly failed as one after another we delivered our ideas with the enthusiasm of cub scouts promised a cut of the takings during Bob-a -Job week.

So much had happened since the coaltion came to power to cause us to be angry, it was a good thing that tea and biscuits hadn’t been provided to refresh us. This showed great cunning by the party elders because, despite our passion and fury at the injustice of cuts to local services, just 45 minutes later, the meeting was over. By then our blood was up and we were ready to start knocking on doors.

I just hope that, when we do, we don’t wake any babies.