Vicki Morris : The Barnet People's Champion

Barnet Bloggers Bank Holiday Special

Continuing our series on the bloggers of Barnet. This week has been a great week for Vicki Morris aka VickiM57. As well as her blog, Vicki is the driving force behind the Barnet Community Campaign. I have unbounded admiration for Vicki. If she'd been hit by a bus last year, I suspect that the Barnet Tories may just have snuck through the warden cuts unnoticed. With her at the helm, there was no chance. The inauguration of the new Mayor was hijacked by the community campaign. His day in the lights was "spoiled" by a ragtag army of protestors outside, fighting for the elderly and the vulnerable. Two weeks ago Finchley High St, in Mike Freer's ward was brought to a standstill by a March organised by the BCC. Now there is much more to BCC than Vicki. She'll probably have the hump with me for pushing her to the fore, but she deserves it and I doubt that anyone else would disagree.

Vicki is unusual in a few respects. Probably 80% of political blogs are written by Tories and 95% are written by men. This hasn't stopped her blog from getting recognition. This week, the esteemed Dave Hill at the Guardian put a link to its from his London page. Now I'm not a close friend of Vicki. We've met at a few meetings & protests in the last few months. WhatI have noticed is that she is a great organiser and a great worker. Her latest blog details how the local press has fallen into line with the Barnet Community Campaign. A petition with 1,600 signatures was handed in to John Marshall, the outgoing mayor. The campaign has only been going a few months, so this should give you some idea of the effectiveness of Vicki's organisational powers.

The powers that be at Barnet spoke this week about taking on the bloggers. If I was them, the one I would truly be scared of is Vicki, because unlike me she knows what she's doing and she knows how to get results quick. Don't be deceived by her mild manners or her pleasant demeanour. When it comes to campaigning, I'm a bull in a China shop, she's a deadly skilled assassin !