Andy Bennetts

With 12 hours to go until the polls open, Lichfield and Burntwood’s candidates have been invited to make one final plea to voters in their own words.

Below is Class War candidate Andy Bennetts’ eve of the election statement…

Andy Bennetts
Andy Bennetts

“This election is drawing to a close, the pantomime is nearly over.

Nationally the campaign has focused on questions of spending and the deficit and the electorate are being mugged off with a narrative from both the Tories and Labour. Since the 2008 financial crash the Tories blame Labour spending for the national debt but the Tories neglect to mention that they never opposed a single Labour spending plan between 1997 and 2008.

In 2007 during the campaign for the election that never was, Osborne made a speech promising to match Labour spending plans for the next three years.

We all know that the reality of the situation is the debt was caused primarily by bail outs for the banks but obviously the Tories, being the party of banks and bankers, won’t blame them. Labour obviously know where the money went, they gave it to the banks, but won’t pull the Tories up on the debt narrative because Labour are the other party of banks and bankers, they’re effectively taking the blame on behalf of the banks. One of these parties is going to form the next government of that there is no doubt.

Whoever you vote for, wherever you are in the country, the government of banks and bankers continues after the election and the poor and the vulnerable will continue to shoulder the burden of the deficit and the national debt caused by bailing out a rotten financial system.

In Lichfield the vagaries of the first past the post system and the tribal nature of constituency politics all but guarantee that Michael Fabricant will be returned as the MP for Lichfield and Burntwood. Our votes here are next to worthless.

Politics doesn’t end with the election. It doesn’t even begin with it. From privatisation of NHS services that are set to give us the grotesque spectacle of cancer and end of life care conducted for profit in Staffordshire, to HS2 tearing up the countryside the issues that effect us are ours to tackle.

There is no alternative on offer in the ballot box. The alternative, if there is to be one, must come from us, the people of this constituency, whether we have lived here all of our lives or moved here only recently. Parties such as UKIP that seek to divide us along lines of race and nationality can only weaken us. If we can come together we can tackle the issues that matter to us. If we can’t, if the extent of our engagement is ticking a box in the election, we’ll get what we’re given.

Don’t vote. Organise.”

The candidates standing in the Lichfield constituency are:

  • Andy Bennetts – Class War
  • Michael Fabricant – Conservatives
  • Robert Pass – Green Party
  • John Rackham – UKIP
  • Paul Ray – Lib Dem
  • Chris Worsey – Labour

Founder of Lichfield Live and editor of the site.

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Darryl
8 years ago

There is no alternative on offer in the ballot box.

I wonder whether you’ve taken the time to read the manifesto’s of the parties for the candidates standing in the Lichfield election? Because I have (no mean feat, believe me), if you have, I can’t see how you could say there’s no real alternative?

In the years I’ve been politically active I can’t remember a ballot paper so diverse. You are to be congratulated because there clearly must be no one within the 6 other parties who strike a chord with your beliefs, rather than wallow, you’ve created your own party. Something which I admire greatly.

Sadly the apathy promotion I can’t get on-board with. Voting is simply too important. Things change at a phenomenally irritating snails pace, but they do change. Yes Fabricant may get back in, but how can you bemoan the fact if he does, if you didn’t vote? That’s is the problem I have with your message.

Andy Bennetts
8 years ago

Read them, understand them and know for a fact that the next government will be formed by either Labour or the Tories. Greens will have one MP at best and absolutely zero influence on anything.

That’s the reality. You can kid yourself on that there’s something to fight for in this election if you want but reality is nothing if not persistent. Come Friday the Greens and their campaign will be a distant memory as all attention turns elsewhere.