Friday, April 29, 2005
Bishop keeps order
Last night was the final hustings in Tooting of this general election campaign. It had been organised by Churches Together and held at the Upper Tooting Methodist Church. I have fond memories of this church as for many years the Labour Party General Committee met in the church hall.
Five of my competitors were there and potentially the hustings could have been 'yah boo' politics at its worst. The Bishop of Kingston, Rt Revd Hugh Montefiore, however had other ideas! He warned all of us at the outset that we needed to be terse in our answers and to the point. I have to be honest and admit that I enjoyed two of my opponents being chastised by the Bishop for not getting to the point of the question and waffling on. Of course the Bishop had no reason to tell me off!
The hustings was very well attended and at one stage the Bishop did a Dimbleby and asked the members of the audience whether they'd vote Yes or No in a referendum on the European constitution. Unfortunately the No's won it by 28 votes to 23, however it was closer than I would have thought bearing in mind the hostility of the media to anything European.
It's quite sad that this will be the last hustings of this campaign as I have thoroughly enjoyed answering in a public forum questions put by constituents. It has also been quite good fun seeing some of my opponents squirm under interrogation from residents about some of their policies.
Sadiq
Five of my competitors were there and potentially the hustings could have been 'yah boo' politics at its worst. The Bishop of Kingston, Rt Revd Hugh Montefiore, however had other ideas! He warned all of us at the outset that we needed to be terse in our answers and to the point. I have to be honest and admit that I enjoyed two of my opponents being chastised by the Bishop for not getting to the point of the question and waffling on. Of course the Bishop had no reason to tell me off!
The hustings was very well attended and at one stage the Bishop did a Dimbleby and asked the members of the audience whether they'd vote Yes or No in a referendum on the European constitution. Unfortunately the No's won it by 28 votes to 23, however it was closer than I would have thought bearing in mind the hostility of the media to anything European.
It's quite sad that this will be the last hustings of this campaign as I have thoroughly enjoyed answering in a public forum questions put by constituents. It has also been quite good fun seeing some of my opponents squirm under interrogation from residents about some of their policies.
Sadiq
