Quote:
Originally Posted by Raymond Finch
So what price would you put on freedom?
Any party should put whatever funds it can raise to gain voter awareness. The fact that we got a lower share than we wanted was down to the fact that lots of voters supported the Tories in order to give Labour (Gordon Brown) a kicking combined with the fact that Labour voters, knowing they had no chance, felt they could, with impunity, lend their votes to the Greens and the BNP (depending on their preference) with the added bonus of telling Labour what they thought of deserting their core voters.
Essentially UKIP got electorally squeezed while our ideological opponents were given a free run. This happens. It was in no way a comment on our campaigning or our (excellent) candidate who, if he had stood in the Euro elections would have been near the top of my list.
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I have to disagree with you. I don't think it is a case that we got "squeezed". Presumably the Greens got "squeezed" by the Lib Dems, yet the Green candidate still managed to come third and spent a small fraction of what we did.
I happen to think that we pursued the wrong strategy in our by-election campaign. We tried to target the entire constituency, something that Labour also tried to do. It's clear from the accounts that they presented, that the Greens and the BNP each targetted a small, local area (from what I have heard, the Green candidate targeted the area in which he lives and where he has previously stood in local elections) and worked those areas very hard, thereby achieving a high percentage of that vote in a small area. The rest of the constituency would have been covered by the election address. We on the other hand spread ourselves thin by trying to leaflet the entire constituency. If we had spent perhaps £2000 and directed all our efforts into a couple of target wards (I think it is fair to say that we have more resources than either the Greens or the BNP and therefore could spend more and target a slightly larger area) and left most of the constituency to be covered by the election address, we could have likely saved our deposit and come a strong third.
The fact is, we simply aren't strong enough to fight an election like the three establishment parties. We need to use our resources wisely and to the greatest effect. From what I have seen, where we are active we can count on a baseline of support of about 5% in local elections, which translates to about 2.5% in a general election when turnout doubles (assuming that none of the non-voters in the local election will vote UKIP at the general election). Where we have been inactive (as in Henley) the baseline is about 1.5%. Simply dropping leaflets through doors in every part of such a constituency won't be enough to raise our vote signicantly. But lots of canvassing, leafleting and general "presence" in a particular area can.
Unfortunately, UKIP seems to prefer to run big flashy campaigns like the three establishment parties even though to do so effectively is beyond our capabilities, rather than trying to get the maximum "bang for it's buck" (please forgive the North Americanism).
Drew Belobaba,
UKIP PPC for Lewes
Wannabe Southeast MEP candidate