I was unusually uninvolved on General Election Day, chatting to the gardener and noting the variety of birds nesting in our gardens. Then lunch at The Beefeater before writing and financial work in the afternoon; preparing for some leaflets for the Local Government election as the General Election in South West Cambridgeshire Anthony Grant Tory stronghold was a waste of time
Following the early-morning mist, another fine day greeted us and, with sunshine on a warm day, a good turnout in the General Election seems assured. It is odd to be at home and laying in on election day and I was soon subjected to a neighbouring visit from somebody who wondered how best they could help. Once up and dressed, I drove the family off to the polling station where Diana, Daniel and I voted, and the girls looked on. Then Diana and Debbie to St Neots, Della home and Daniel off in his own car to visit Angela after which I chatted to the gardener as we are going to be away for a while.
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The gardens are looking very nice with the grass greened up and trimmed, the bulbs at their height, and the foliage coming back on the trees. We have collared doves nesting in our Hawthorne tree, blackbirds in the back garden bush, house sparrows in the house martin nest boxes, tits in the tree boxes and starlings in the garage roof voids. The greenhouse is full of seedlings to make bedding plants and is a picture. I kept Della company and returned some telephone calls for the rest of the morning and then collected the girls for lunch at the Beefeater before settling down to my journal and some financial work in the afternoon. I called up a few colleagues and checked how their preparations were going for the local government elections next and then offered to prepare the 'out' slips for each of the four initial candidates.
After tea I had completed these and then printed off the masters and some samples and took them around to everyone for their approval. In passing, I noted that many of them were hard at work copying and guillotining the introductory leaflets that will be added into the weekend edition of FOCUS to get the campaign under-way. I thought that their efforts were much better expended in this way rather than fighting the lost cause of the S.W. Cambs parliamentary election. I visited the polling stations at Paxton and saw the local Tories swarming all over it and was glad that they were occupying themselves thus and not doing likewise. Returning to Paxton, Southoe and Diddington later I found the election turnouts to be 80%, 72% and 88% respectively which was exceptional for any election. Home after the stations closed and then to settle down in front of the TV for the election results. I
had intended to do some paperwork as I watched but the developments were so exciting that I could not. In this last few days of the campaign the Labour opinion poll lead of two points had evaporated and the exit polls had the parties dead level with a 'hung' parliament the consensus of all of the polling organisations. The results were late due to the problems of counting the large number of slips and it soon became apparent that the Tories were not losing by as much as was forecast and gradually the predictions became more and more favourable until they looked set to gain a small overall majority when I finally went to bed at 3.00am. Bad news from my point of view.