The Lib Dem leaflet

Canvassing on Granville Road yesterday I discovered that the Lib Dems have issued a local leaflet. I am very disappointed that much of it is negative campaigning against the Green Party and would like to put a few points straight.

Manor Castle is most definitely not a “2 horse race” between Labour and Lib Dem. As you can see from the graph, the Greens came second to Labour last year, and are closing the gap fast.

Lib Dems say “Voting for any other party just helps Labour here”. This is just silly! The more votes and councillors the Greens get, the more influence we will have in the Council chamber. In the event of a tie between the Labour and Lib Dems, the Greens could hold the balance of power alongside the Tories and the one Independent Councillor.

Lib Dems say “Greens fail on the environment”. They claim that we have failed because we didn’t support their budget amendment to increase recycling. What they don’t tell you is that the two Green Councillors voted against their budget because of the cuts that were proposed to other vital Council services. We do of course want better recycling facilities. See our full waste policy here.

Lib Dems say “the Greens just back Labour”. This is not true. Sometimes the 2 Green Councillors have supported Lib Dem motions, sometimes they have supported Labour motions, and quite often they have disagreed with both parties. We backed the Lib Dem motions against the war on Iraq and on Trust Schools; we supported Labour’s emerging strategy on renewable energy generation, though we pushed them to go further and set a carbon footprint and reduction targets for the city as a whole and to do more on energy saving (e.g. insulation,
public transport); we would go much further than Lib Dems or Labour in supporting local businesses – we were the only ones who spoke out against Sheffield’s Supercasino bid, that if it had been successful, would have put lots of pubs and clubs out of business. Unlike the other parties the Greens don’t have “whips” that ensure Councillors vote in a certain way, and we vote on each issue as we see fit. If we do have a hung council it will be very interesting to see how the other parties cope with our different style of politics.

I think it is very sad when politics stoops so low that we can’t believe what is written in election leaflets. It’s what puts people off politics and causes people to mistrust all politicians. I wish politicians would just campaign for what they believe in, rather than misrepresenting what the others are saying.