Pledges

I don't know if it was because I was selected so late last time round and didn't make it onto the lobbyists' databases, or whether it's just because campaign groups have got much more internet-savvy, but I'm getting a lot of requests to sign up to pledges and respond to candidates' surveys on all sorts of things. (In 2005 I had just the one, from the protect public toilets campaign, much to the amusement of all my friends).

In most cases the groups will be posting the results online, so that people can check to see if their local candidates have signed up or how they've responded, but I'm going to try to see if I can put links to at least some on my own website too, in the interests of letting as many people as possible know what I've done or said. Will try to get that sorted in the coming week. Here's one that I've more or less replied to, from Election Crossroads (I ignored some of the questions because I didn't think it was possible to give a yes or no answer, and commented in the space below). Incidentally, I know my Green Party opponent has press released the fact I haven't replied to this one, from DemRef - I have, actually - I assume they will be updating it soon. And I've just emailed another organisation because I think they've recorded my responses wrong, possibly because I tried to give a more intelligent answer than just yes/ no, which ends up getting recorded as prevarication or fence-sitting, whereas sometimes it's actually about not seeing things in black and white, or not liking the way the question is phrased. Maybe it's the lawyer in me, I can always see the possible caveats....

None of this matters a great deal in the big scheme of things, but it all adds up to letting people know a little bit about you, and like I said in the previous post, it's important people know who they're electing, even if most of them vote for the party, not the candidate.