Why the Barnet Conservatives will win in the London Borough of Barnet despite their abject failure to deliver services

I started a review of social media and Tory/Labour websites yesterday. What I found was shocking.

I am going to say this now, then I am going to STF up completely about the subject until after the council elections in May. Basically, I don't think that Barnet Labour will win in the Loindon Borough of Barnet and even if they do, they don't deserve to. That is not to say I think the Barnet Tories deserve to. Their abject and complete failure has been catalogued on this blog and on the other blogs of Barnet and this week Mr Reasonable has produced a series of the most damning blogs imaginable, laying bare the complete failure of the Barnet Tories. If you haven't read the series of five blogs Mr Reasonable AKA John Dix has produced over the last nine days, then you really must - Click here  http://reasonablenewbarnet.blogspot.co.uk/ - John has produced five excellent blogs ripping apart the crazy situation where Barnet Council closes down services and gives up to a third of the savings to Capita, their contractor of choice. Your cash is being given to private contractors simply for suggesting that Barnet residents get a worse level of services.

If anyone knows the huge amount of work John Dix has to put in to produce these blogs, I should. He doesn't get any thanks for doing it. He isn't paid. God knows, if I ever run Barnet Council, I'd give him the Freedom of The Borough, recommend him for a knighthood and make him the "Money Saving Tsar". Not because he's a mate. Although I like John we only see each other at events where we are on official blogging business. Its because he has worked tirelessly to try and make the Tories of Barnet see sense. He has produced hundreds of well researched blogs, far better written than my dyslexic musings. Unlike my blogs, they are not tainted by opinion and personal axes to grind.They are simply the facts laid bare.

So why has all Johns hard work destroying the credibility of the Barnet Tories convinced me that the Conservatives will win in the Barnet Council elections? Because Barnet Labour are completely chaotic and useless. Why do I say this? Because John Dix should be a huge asset in the armoury of Barnet Labour. Sadly however, they can't even be bothered to tweet his scathing reports. John is not a Labour member and is highly respected, yet their official twitter feed makes no mention of his work. I can understand why they generally ignore my blogging and tweeting, even though much of it supports their case to take over. John's blogging is the biggest asset that Labour could imagine. They should be shouting it from the rafters. However the Labour party in Barnet seem to think tweeting their Burns night shebang is more likely to persuade voters than retweeting John's blogs that destroy the case for the Tories to run the Borough

Childs Hill candidate @nigel_young1 addresses @BarnetLabour Burns Night. In addition to being a regeneration expert with lots of good ideas about Brent Cross/Cricklewood Regeneration, he’s excellent at reciting poetry. pic.twitter.com/p716Aw9vX5

— Childs Hill Labour Action Team (@ChildsHillLab) January 28, 2018

The leader of the Barnet Labour Party is Barry Rawlings. He clearly can't be bothered with the hassle of retweeting John Dix's blogs either. The former leader was Alison Moore. She can't be bothered to retweet John either. The Barnet Labour party social media strategists simply see Twitter as something to put nice puctures of Labour supporters doing the sort of thing Labour supporters have done for decades. In short, they have their head buried in the sand and are wasting a fantastic opportunity to engage with thousands of Barnet voters.

It gives me no pleasure at all to say this, but the Barnet Tories are a far more professional outfit when it comes to social media. Their tweets get strong messages across. Admittedly, they don't really seem capable of writing their own tweets but they are completely on the ball at getting the messages over that Central office is spewing out. I suppose it is fair to say that the Council Leader, Richard Cornelius has only managed 2 tweets, the last being in 2016, but the organisation gets it.

I've spoken to many local Labour activist recently. I get on with most, as I was a member of the party until 2009 and I share many of their values. However, the wrong people are running the party. They need a clearout and they need to get people in who get the way you change people's minds in 2018. When I raise these issues, they spew out details of all of the doorknocking that is being done and the street stalls. They said the same in 2002, 2006, 2010 and 2014.  There are key areas which will matter for Labour. The key one is Hale Ward. This is a ward where they have a massive opportunity. They have one councillor and if they got the other two, they'd win the council. But their social media hardly mentions it. This is under the jurisdiction of The Hendon Labour Party.  Their Twitter account is truly bizarre, with tweets boasting that they are staying in bed because its a bit cold and damp out

Todays canvass in Hale has been cancelled due to the inclement weather.

— Hendon Labour Party (@HendonLabour) January 21, 2018

This is totally bonkers. I can understand why they may cancel a canvassing session, but to say it on social media, where opponents can have a field day. Not a single tweet detailing why Hale voters should vote Labour. Not a single reason why anyone but an activist should even look at the Twitter account.

If you look at The Hendon Labour website, you will be greeted with a lovely picture, with Andrew Dismore in the middle, standing next to Alison Moore. Dismore is the candidate who lost in Hendon to Matthew Offord in 2010 and 2015 (he didn't stand in 2017 and Mike Katz slashed Tory Matthew Offord's majority). He is standing next to Alison Moore, who lost Council elections as Barnet Council Labour Leader in 2006, 2010 and 2014.  As for the news page of the Hendon Conservatives website, the latest news is from April 2017. Is this how modern campaigning is done?

The Council elections in May are just over three months away. Labour believes that Barnet is a serious target. They are marching teams of activists up and down the hills of the London Borough of Barnet. They remind me of The Grand Old Duke of York. You can have the biggest army in the world, if you have lousy leaders you will fail. I am sure there will be much gnashing and grinding of teeth in Labour circles when they read this. It gives me no pleasure to upset their hard working activists, but wake up and smell the coffee guys. And I am sure that there are lots of people in the local Tory party wetting themselves laughing as they read this. I'd caution them in two ways, firstly I'm not Mystic Meg and I've been wrong in predictions as often as I've been right. I'd also suggest that they consider the fact that now I've pointed out that the Labour campaign strategy is absolute crap, there is always a remote possibility that they will actually take note and sort out their social media and run it professionally.

And with that, I will STFU about the subject until May.


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