In The Rigging

Coming from an incumbent President of the United States, "I could only lose a rigged election" is full strength, full throttle stuff. But of course, it might be true. Next year, only a rigged election could keep Labour in Overall Control of Durham County Council. Not that anyone here would bat an eyelid. We are used to these people. I have lost many an election in my time, but only my attempt to enter the hallowed portals of County Hall has been rigged.

I was never going to win, but that was not good enough. I had to be humiliated, recorded as having taken far fewer votes than everyone knew that I really had, and denied a Parish Council seat on the same day. I have never heard of anyone else who had failed to win a Parish Council seat on the same day as they had sought a District or County seat in the same ward. It did not really happen. Likewise, I took more than 203 votes in each of Lanchester and Burnhope. But hey, ho. Like everyone else, I witnessed far worse abuses at the count that night, committed entirely in the open. Welcome to County Durham.

Two and a half years later, I had to deal with County Hall again, because it was running the parliamentary elections on its patch. Again, I was never going to win. But again, that was not good enough. Unlike every other candidate across six constituencies, I was not given an appointment time to submit my nomination papers and my deposit, so that in the end I just had to turn up and insist on being seen. I was simply never sent the electoral register.

Some of them later corrected the error, although not through any intervention of mine, but several of the local and regional media, which are closely connected to the right-wing Labour machine, did not initially mention my name or total when reporting the result at North West Durham. All right, I had come bottom of the poll. But even so.

The word on the street seems to be that I am already standing for Parliament next time, and that that is a given. Well, the judge specifically left that option open, because like everyone else he knew what he was dealing with. See above. The judge, the Police, the Probation Service, the court-appointed psychiatrist, the people who run unpaid work when it is running: all of them openly regard me as obviously innocent, and all those are able to say so, say so out loud. Again I say that only ballot-rigging could save the Labour Party in County Durham next year.

So here is the deal. If by Easter of next year I had raised £20,000, then I would spend half of that slowly until the dissolution of the present Parliament, and the other half in the course of the official campaign leading up to the next General Election. I would do so in the constituency where the most people had asked me to stand. If this appeal were to be launched and never reach its £20,000 target, then any monies raised would be donated to charity. You might very well find it more efficient to give your money directly to charity. But if we did raise the money, then my candidacy would go ahead. Sometime next month, watch this space.