By My name is Chris Ostrowski, and I am the Labour candidate in Norwich North. I am writing to you directly from the campaign trail.
When I was asked to write something for LabourList, I was pleased to get the chance to share my thoughts with you and, frankly, to ask you all for your help.
First, let me tell you about what’s really going on in this by-election, then let me tell you how you can help.
The Tories think they can win this hands down and are showing signs that they are taking it for granted.
Yet Norwich people know that over the past 12 years, the city has prospered under Labour.
I could feel and see the city getting even better during the five years that I spent here at the University of East Anglia. Life certainly got better for me during my time in Norwich - it’s where I met my wife Katie, and it’s where I started my working life. Sometimes it feels like the only thing to have suffered over the past 12 years here has been the fortunes of the Canaries, and even they have high hopes for next season!
Crime is down; and the number of police officers continues to rise.
We have seven Sure Start centres; in 1997, of course, there were none.
Only on Monday, Ed Balls joined me on the campaign trail to see a great example of Labour investment when we went to visit Sewell Park College. I’ve genuinely never met a group of pupils who are so proud of their school and their newly redeveloped surroundings. That’s what Labour investment has delivered in Norwich and I’m really proud of it.
Yesterday, I was out with Yvette Cooper to visit a training scheme that has had public investment to help Norwich people back into work. Labour’s investment in Norwich is helping to support people through the recession. We won’t leave people on the scrapheap.
And yet, we face a tough fight to hold this seat.
It’s true that there are people who are upset about the situation with Ian Gibson. But, Ian has been clear with people that he has spoken to: he doesn’t want to see a Tory MP elected in Norwich North and he wants people to turn out and vote Labour next Thursday. I’m grateful to him for passing that message of support on to Parliamentary colleagues and to the media.
I have been out and about with a great team of door-knockers, and it’s clear that we can win. But we need a massive effort to turn out a Labour vote that has been left deflated by the justified public anger over expenses. I’m not a Westminster insider or career politician and I have never worked in politics - so I can understand how ordinary people feel over the expenses issue.
And when I get the chance to spend time with voters on their doorsteps, and explain to them that it is between us and the Tories, time after time, people do tell me that they’re going to come out and vote Labour. But I need your help to get our message out to people in Norwich.
If the Tories win the seat, it will be because Labour voters have stayed at home. If Labour voters stay at home, it will be because we haven’t taken the opportunity to speak to them and convince them to turn out and vote.
I’m asking for you to avoid the frustration of kicking yourself on the 24th. Come to Norwich and help us to stop the Tories between now and then. My Campaign Centre is at Unit 9, Concorde Road, Norwich, NR6 6BH. Give us a call on 01603 622107 and arrange a time to come and help us win Norwich North.
Yours,
Chris Ostrowski
Visit Chris' Norwich North homepage, get involved in the campaign, and help keep Norwich North Labour.
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... Because they are the government... doh!
"Well, instead of a local worthy who has the respect of the community, we could parachute in a spotty youth from London who has never had a proper job, and hopefully with a foreign sounding name".
"How about if he is gay as well?".
"Brilliant, that should do it".
Maybe he could eat some Sport Candy to beat off the flu.
Fortunately, most people (including those in Norwich) aren't backwards bigots like yourself and don't attach any importance to these trivial details.
The man's character and policy beliefs are what matters.
Are they still sitting?
Will there be any further deselections?
Or are the cynical shower at New Labour hoping we have all forgotten about the CGT avoidance of Purnell and the phatommortgages of Morely and Chaytor?
You're right though. No forum to ask this, and I gather there was no opportunity given at the Star Chamber either, for Ian to put his case. A very Charles 1st modus operandi, given he was the last to use a 'Star Chamber'.
It did him no good either.
If this becomes a lost seat, it's an entirely self inflicted loss.
I shall contact some people I worked with in Norfolk and ask them to help you. I have good memories of the Norwich Labour Party and the Hospital and Library were no small achievement. I shall wait until I get a low down on you. If your a careerist xxxx then you can help yourself...after all that is generally what they all do anyway isn't it.
And yet, we face a tough fight to hold this seat."
Chris, did you take the opportunity toa sk Cooper why she has not looked again at the Freud/Purnell welfare "reforms" or to question her on the fact reported in the Financial Times and Evening Standard that three quarters of all claims for ESA are turned down and people with severe health problems are being put on JSA instead?
Yes or no?
If you just meekly accepted a photoshoot with a member of Cabinet (however weak and insipid) and din't ask any important questions, you don't deserve to win.
I'd be careful with that one. According to the latest Norfolk Constabulary figures in June 2009 compared to June 2008 robberies in Norwich went up from 8 to 13; crimes of violence went up from 242 to 246 and anti-social behaviour went from 1295 to 1401
Maybe not the strongest set of stats to use to support your argument??
I'd drop the crime selling point... and watch your wallet on those doorsteps!!
I regard myself as a traditional labour supporter and so do many of your potential constituents. Therefore, before offering you support, I want to know the following:
Where do you stand on the current government position of bailing out the banks without any real impositions or conditions on their activities?
Do agree we should be moving towards a huge investment in public sector housing, to provide homes for people on waiting lists (I am one of these!) and also to create jobs (I am, again, one of these - Building Surveying Graduate looking for work; any offers will be considered!!)?
What is your position on the Iraq war and the continued presense in Afganistan?
That's 20/1 in a constituency with a 5,500 + majority. One would imagine that would concentrate the minds of every MP with a sub 10,000 majority and make them consider whether, perhaps, the party may be going in the wrong direction.
low-carbon manufacture. Not a single turbine of the 7000 the government has committed to be buying will now be made in the UK.You could not hope to meet a greater bunch of lying hypocrites if you tried. Good luck with the election - I hope you lose your deposit.
Where are our core values of supporting the British worker?
Plenty of government and union bods seem to be hereabouts...
How about it alex?
Crappy company that deserves to go bust, or ignorant short-sighted government who don't do 'joined up'.
FWIW: This seems to be one of the classic areas that annoys me about labour - I am no fan of green/cabonless nonsense - but if my taxes are going to be thrown away on them, then wtf can't they be thrown away in this country? Give us a 'but at least' as in "I wouldn't have chosen that myself, BUT AT LEAST...."
Um .. a maroon tie doesn't go with a dark blue shirt
Maybe he does not work in the gent's clothes section, which was my guess (but no idea why) at JLP!
Chris, how is it clear that you can win?
Every week I seem to hear a politician come out and tell me how he/she knows how I feel about expenses. Well done, they have correctly assessed that stealing money from the public purse is somewhat frowned on by the taxpayer, but the expenses scandal isn't why the Labour vote has collapsed.
With the greatest respect Chris, you are about to repeat the mistakes of previous by-elections by going to the doorstep and telling people the difference between the Conservative party and the Labour Party. If you turned up on my doorstep with that line of argument, I wouldn't give you the time of day because I'm not interested in what the Conservatives will or won't do, I want to know what the Labour Party will do!
Your best bet on the doorsteps of Norwich is to keep quiet and let the voter do the talking, listen to their concerns and reassure them that you are the man to sort out those concerns. Explain why you have the experience and knowledge to support them locally and tell them how you will represent them in the Houses of Parliament, but don't spend your time discussing another political party, avoid mentioning you've spent any time with Ed Balls or Yvette Cooper and please quit the 'I understand' line.
You don't have to understand how people feel on expenses, you have to understand why they won't come out and vote Labour because of the issues that effect them. It must be a really tough job to seperate what you are told by Ed Balls whilst campaigning and what the truth of the matter is, but the truth is Chris huge numbers of former Labour voters don't feel better off for having a Labour government. Huge numbers don't recognise the current government as Labour, and shout from the rooftops about SureStart, but that is no replacement for parents being able to earn decent money, not have to fork it out in taxes and give their children a sure start in life without having to beg for state handouts. There were no SureStart centres before 1997 Chris because people didn't need them, they didn't need Tax Credits to be able to pay a gas bill, their council tax for a small town terrace wasn't over a thousand pounds a year and it was a damn sight cheaper to buy good food.
If you don't address the issues that really bother people Chris, even if you win the by-election, you've still wasted your time because you'll become another faceless backbencher waiting for his expenses cheque to come through from the fees office.
You 'understand' how 'ordinary people' feel over expenses?
Maybe if you considered yourself an 'ordinary person' you would feel it yourself, rather than having to understand it in others.
But, already, you have clearly put yourself above the 'hoi polloi' who actually vote - and your own words give you away.
By talking about 'ordinary people' in the third person you show that you are already out of touch.
He has spent the last two years employed as Treasurer of the Christian Socialist Movement and he was off to do an MA in International Relations at a university in Madrid.
If that isn't typical of the Student -> Reasearch Ass, Adviser, Think Tank wonk -> MP career path, what is? He clearly hasn't had to dirty his hands with a job in the real world.
He seems to be perfect New Labour lobby-fodder right down to his religious credentials and probably without a real Labour idea in his head.
I suspect, though, that come July 24th he will STILL be a wanabee MP
It was here only the other day that someone spoke of long-shot seats being used at training grounds on the way to the fast-path to MPhood.
He works for John Lewis.
See: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/michaelcrick/2009/07/labour_candidate_planned_degre.html
It wasn't good.
I certainly wouldn't go round telling everyone how you have been hanging out with Ed 'So What?' Balls. I cannot think of a more universally hated politician other than the PM himself.
Tell me, has Brown paid a visit?
Thought not.
Chris Ostrowski's 25 point pledge to clean up politics makes tedious reading but might have brightened his day job being a partner at JLP.
More importantly, they asked Mr. Ostrowski about Gibson's direction and he tried to completely dodge the question and sounded like (to my ears) just another careerist weasel.