dazza333

Amanda, I'm sorry but as much as I respect you I have to disagree and say that IOC had 4 years to plan but naïvely left it all until the last minute. As a nurse I can tell you that with every single patient that comes onto a ward discharge planning commenced immediately, thus, after the last election would you not have thought it wise to plan for the next election immediately, set the wheels in motion, plan recruitment for targeted attainable wards etc....or shall we leave it for 3 years and 47 weeks then quickly sod off down the Barrels for a meeting, see who knows 25 passionate and loud people who can knock a few doors, blow the whistle and wait to see how many make it past the post? I think I witnessed the latter.....

Adrian "lessons will be learned"...no they wont. IOC don't have basic planning or strategy knowledge. I wouldn't trust them to be capable of organising a Saturday afternoon bbq. and the Independents appear to be a bunch of egotistical narcissists. The Torys looked to me like a well oiled, organised machine albeit clones of one another, who will march virtually uncontested throughout Herefordshire for many years to come until finally a truly independent leader comes along and binds a group together properly whether that be the Independents, IOC or whoever, and is able to strategise and plan for the future with patience. With what I have just witnessed with these local elections I am ashamed to have been part of it. I should have stood on the sidelines throwing eggs and rotting veg at the players.

Hi all, and bloody well said Bobby. I'm Darrell Meekcom and I did stand in the Credenhill Ward for IOC. Right here we go: Recruitment policy - You'll do. Manifesto - basic at best. Strategy - war of attrition. Planning - none. Ideas - trams etc... I was asked to do the Credenhill Ward 5 weeks before the election despite IOC having had 4 years to find people and plan, 25 others of us were also thrown into the mix with this short time span despite having had, as I said, 4 years to plan. In that 5 weeks and despite Credenhill being the second largest populated ward I was given absolutely no help leafleting which I did thrice and no help whatsoever canvassing and door knocking. No help at all, nil, zero, nada! Strategically Credenhill was a massive scalp for IOC; taking down Bob Matthews the leader of the Independents AND moreover creating a big gateway to the typically Tory Blue rural wards, and what do you think those in charge within IOC did? Nothing, nil, zero, nada. I have never known such poor planning, poor strategic nouse, poor recruitment, poor timing. Please forgive me if I sound very much like a bad loser but the ward was there for the taking. As a total unknown and with no help I scored the most votes Matthews had ever had against him in 5 weeks. If Id stood for the Torys I would have taken this seat. So, Its Our County is it? Nope, Its Our Cock up. Imagine Herefordshire if IOC had taken charge of the Council? Stop stop! I'll have nightmares......

PS I got that vote with no canvassing or leafleting help from IOC, I did that alone.

Hi flamboyant, I agree totally with the theme of your post, however, with Credenhill I had ulterior motives for standing against Matthews. Firstly it was a show of strength for the imagination station nursery which the PC with allegedly Matthews acknowledgement has issued them with 2 notices to quit. Secondly it was to advertise IOC to the Credenhill ward in anticipation of a Matthew's retirement, who knows. And in hindsight we came second albeit by 1 vote to a known Tory with 430 votes to Julia Blackshaws 429 (not 449 as reported by Hereford Times). This was all done on the space of 4 weeks from my deciding to stand to election day, so to me and IOC, this was a very successful day. My 430 votes was the largest opposition vote polled against Matthews in 30 years and I got that in 4 weeks, imagine if I was given 4 months?

Thanx dippy, much appreciated.

Glenda there were some shocking results yesterday, yours being one of them, Charlie Nichols another etc, I saw our new councillors yesterday and for all bar the odd few I hang my head in shame for our duped, apathetic electorate.

Please forgive me if I sound like an arrogant bad loser....but....I was shocked by the winners of certain wards, for example, the winner of Stoney Street, where I live, is a short, fat, toothless, scruffy, unkempt little chap...a Tory who, on questioning knows nothing of Swainshill or Bishopstone or the people that live here and what their needs are...lots of farms...now in the hands of a gormless berk at the expense of the impressive James Stokes who has lived and worked with this ward all of his life. It really just goes to show...and you will probably dislike me for this....that the Herefordshire electorate at present is easily duped or simply not bothered. I went around taking a few of my own boards down yesterday, and whilst doing so asked one or two people why they had voted Bob Matthews, the replies; "because we recognised his name on the voting slip"!!! OMG! Not one mention of what he has or hasn't done or what he stands for, the answer being, not a lot. In the short time I've been I Hereford I've helped save Credenhills nursery from potential closure and helped put Hereford County Hospital in Special Measures. Please enlighten me as to why I should stand up for these people again?

Spot on mikefitz!

Chris Chappel, you are a thoroughly decent man. Together we can get the colour Blue from the minds of the electorate!

Saxon Gate will be re run because many voters ticked two boxes as previously they had voted for 2 candidates.

Dippy, you are absolutely correct, we really need a long term strategy to beat the Torys starting now. We can antagonise them and generally be a thorn in their side by spreading the word. I looked around at the Torys at the count today and they all looked the same, it was like being I a room full of assimilated automatons or the Borg! Totally soul less with no personality. IOC worked on the strategy of attrition but history tells us that never works. If we put forward a smaller number of candidates, picked our fights and heavily advertised and canvassed every door we will win control of the next council.

I know it makes no difference to the result of the Credenhill ward but the Hereford Times had reported that I came 3rd to Julia Blackshaw, that is wrong, she did not get 449 votes she got 429 votes and I beat her. Is the Hereford Times a Tory paper by any chance?

Bless you dippy 😊 Well Bob Matthews has held that seat for 30 years and has a large old guard vote, I polled the biggest vote against him in all that time and beat the Tory so its mot so bad and something to build on. We'll take Credenhill either in a by-election or in 4 years....watch this space 😉 Thank you for your support 😊

Amanda Martin do you mean £45k per annum? If not and you mean £45 then I feel that that is reasonable annual expenses expenditure 😉

I'm hoping James Stokes takes Stoney Street, lots of Kenchester support for him down at Bridge Sollars earlier today.

Robert Ruck.....brilliant fella 😊

Thank you so much Dippy!! Elected or not what an important site Hereford Voice is for real-time topics within Herefordshire. Thank you.

As such my point is; the back pay will come in very handy for the Indys 😊

The Herefordshire 'Independents' aren't actually independent are they, and according to their recent advert in the Hereford Times they've actually incorporated the 'Unattached' candidates and councillors into their ranks......that'll cost them a few bob in court 😉

Hi dippy, just read it, its unbelievable that this is going on under our noses??

This needs reporting.

That's totally illegal mentioning religion on an electoral leaflet!! The Freedom church? Haven't they been kicked out of Swansea university recently? Pay per prayer rip off thing?

Mikefitz What similarity is there between ukip and IOC? @baffled