A full day and night of managing my polling day; delivering early morning ‘Please vote Today’ slips, knocking up supporters and telling their numbers at the polling stations, attending the count and noting my famous victory emerging (by 1141 to 434) and then publicising my victory to the press and upon supporters flag-boards. I did well but other results were mixed.
An early start to the day. Up at 5.30am, after Di brought me some tea and then quickly dressed and showered to find Michael Pope arrived at 6.00m. I stayed behind, whilst Mike leafleted Southoe and I put out a table with the other batches of ‘Please vote today’ slips, pre-arranged in walk order for our definite and probable supporters only. Then arrived Francis and Rob Williams, Pete While, Stuart Aldridge and Joe Wilcox, who took a round each as I waited and vacuumed out the swimming pool at the same time. We all repaired to the Little Chef for breakfast (where we shared the cost) and then came back to start the knocking up process – gently at first and then with increased persuasiveness as the day progressed. From the canvassed list of definites and probables, lists of voters were created and their names crossed off by number taking outside the polling station. The turnout was high and there were scenes of congestion outside the Paxton polling booth and long queues. More and more urgency and near panic as the last hour was upon us – with 5 cars back and fro, knocking up a reducing number of supporters, until the booth closed. Then we mustered to watch the count.
A strange thing, as Jeanette Green avoided talking to me and continued to avoid me all evening. We were let in. Ian Gunn came as an interested supporter and also my two official counting agents of Michael Pope and Moira Biggins. First, the individual papers were counted for each of the three polling booths (Little Paxton, Southoe and Diddington). Then, they were put together and jumbled after checking that the numbers in each batch were right for the box. The piles mounted up then for each of the candidates and soon my victory was very obvious, with a ratio of 2-3 to 1 over Miss Green. It had ended up as a record 62% turnout of total electors voting, which was the largest in the district, region and probably the country. Then, my majority at more than 700 (me 1141, Green 434 and Labour 50) was the largest on the District Council and both facts gave me a terrific mandate to represent the area and implement my ideas. We met back at my house and drank a bottle of champagne. Our joy a little muted by the poor showing of other SLD candidates in the election. We phoned Radio Cambridge and got a news story broadcast about the record turnout and shock result, which had the effect of reporting SLD performance as ‘mixed’ – a singular improvement on the gloom that would otherwise prevail. Then the Cambridge Evening News phoned for a news story and then a photo call, which was done at 1.30am (!) outside my house. The event coincided with us putting ‘Thank you, we won’ labels on all of our flag boards to thank, inform the public and provide excuse to keep the boards up a few days longer. It was 2.30am by the time I could sleep, but a day worth remembering. We had mobilised 80% of our vote and got it out on the day!