David A Broad
A personal story
More than 40 years, told day by day
Meeting up with Di’s parents and making a car offer, undertaking Ropes Hill Dyke road correspondence, and making a Cambridge Street visit with Nigel.
A one-day rail strike called for the next day after failed pay negotiations and Tottenham Hotspur are on the receiving end of some draconian punishments for making illegal payments to players and staff
The warm sunny weather continued and Sam continued to moult his winter/puppy coat. I took him swimming this morning before the advent of the fishing season would make his use of the pits too disruptive. He did a good split water retrieve under direction by signal and whistle so that I could call him off one retrieve and get him to do another first.
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On another warm and sunny day, confirmation of the Tories appalling Euro-election results after which there were more calls from his party for John Major’s resignation.
A good walk with Sam who I find is always better-behaved with other dogs after trips to his events. He also did a nice water retrieve with a difficult entry and quartered well and was in the act of pointing a pair of partridges when I called him off inadvertently.
More work with the Town Council LibDem group and post-election admin. Nigel Smith dropped by, anxious to salt away a picnic hamper and contents so that Lynn would not know he had been out philandering instead of working!
Like yesterday, we had more warm and sunny weather and just about no wind. With quite fresh air and low humidity, it was still comfortable and very nice.
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Up early and out to drive to The Showground at Retford for the GSP Club Annual Championship Show where Sam came 5th out of his Novice Dog Class of 8 to earn the white rosette for being "Very Highly Commended" but he could only manage a best time of 15 seconds against the winning time of 11 in the scurry.
Percy collected me for the drive to see Ross McKay for a difficult meeting to try to stop him being so undiplomatic, controversial and divisive and we read the riot act.
Then a heart-to-heart with Sally and Brian about her workload after which Wiggly took on the role of LibDem Town Council Group Secretary. Up late watching the results of the EuroElection
I was awake early and had time to give Diana some attention before getting up and out to walk Sam. We had a long drive ahead of us to The Showground at Retford for the GSP Club Annual Championship Show but we got off in reasonable time and the roads were relatively clear.
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An active and warm day for my delayed recovery with Sam impressing Della who joined Diana and I for a trip to St Neots. Meeting Debbie outside The Lewis Hall by arrangement.
She was in her games kit and we had come to see her run 1500 metres as practice for next week's sports day.
The Cambridge Evening News did us proud with a full front page covering our by-election victory story including a full colour picture entitled "No end to Major's misery".
The Liberal Democrats also won the Eastleigh Parliamentary By-Election from the Tories in a landslide
We were in bed quite early last night and I appreciated the long rest accordingly. The only problem was that we had the bedclothes off as it had been very warm and I was chilly this morning as a result.
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The Hemingford Abbots & Hilton Count at The St Ivo Centre, where I organised the sampling by our counting agents and found that we had won 53% of Hemingford Abbots and 58% of Hilton to give a very satisfying overall result of Mark Rainer 486, Linda Horner 378, and a winning majority for us of 108! publicity and recovery.
I had already composed and faxed a press release to papers and radio stations first thing, pre-warning them of an evolving news story and now we drove back to The Hayling View to compose and fax another with the result.
We got radio interviews for Mark on Radio Cambridgeshire and Chiltern Radio and then coverage on the day from the Cambridge Evening News with the theme of the Tories losing one of their safest seats in John Major's own back yard and the story ran on news bulletins all day.
Only after that would I engage with Derek and Sandy Giles about Ross McKay’s behaviour
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Walking Sam before and after managing our St Ives troops into battle for the Hemingford Abbots & Hilton By-election. This involved early morning deliveries and explaining the operation and use of Ears to the St Ives helpers and working late to collect my equipment and to correlate the statistics and prepare things against the morning before I could afford to go to bed.
We had a fairly mild but quite showery and wet day but by the end of it, by my figures, we had got out over 80% of our vote and over 70% of the electorate as a whole.
Another full day of activity as I marched our St Ives area troops into battle in a very tight campaign for polling day. It started with the die-hards getting up early to deliver reminders to all our supporters before the polls opened at 7.00am.
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