I would like to say congratulations to Sam Arnold and Nigel Knowles on their success in the district elections.

I would also like to say thank you to all those who helped in all those varied ways throughout this campaign, all of them were invaluable and although we didn’t have the same resources as the Tories or Ukip, I feel the determination and workload of our activists made this a successful campaign. We were there on the streets and in the town centres, we engaged people and Wyre Forest activists did their best to make sure all residents in our area were contacted.

This was a successful campaign at street level so thanks to all of you.
Our results and in some respects those of UKIP seem a consequence of other factors, I feel that the change in positions of Polling Stations and the long queues that have been observed at these indicate that the chances for some of the electorate were stressed (how many walked away because of this and how many thought the Polling Station was too far to walk to). A question I think needs to be framed to say that we feel that some have been disenfranchised by changes to Polling Station locations giving a bias that helped (it seems) others.

However across the Country Labour’s message didn’t attract the voters we hoped it would. So now we get up and start again, the next five years are going to be a greater struggle for those who have the least, Austerity will continue and benefit cuts and sanctions will increase.

We stand alone within the Political system because of our moral principles and our ideas, ideals and our imagination, that when all in our society are equal we succeed. As a society we have to fight to protect those who are the weakest. Wyre Forest needs the Labour Party, just as the country needs the Labour Party our mission and our ambitions should be to engage all from today to get our message out there, write to the Star and Shuttle, use social media, challenge anything we think is wrong. We need to get people to know that we are there, people need to know our names and know that we represent the Labour Party. Having said that I will only say thanks and that the fight back starts today.

Since the Election, Labour membership has increased by over 20,000 as the implications of a Tory majority start to sink in. If you would like to join the fight back, contact mail@wyreforestlabour.co.uk

Bernadette Connor