So we're sat in the New Oxford pub and all three Green Party candidates for the General Election are urging people to go to the https://voteforpolicies.org.uk, where people look at loads of policies and decide which they like best. Only at the end does it match those policies with a political party*.
Incredibly, for the Blackley and Broughton constituency with its sitting Labour MP Graham Stringer, the results show the Green Party out in front with almost 30% of the `vote', with Labour trailing on just over 26.5%. It's only a very small survey of those who have bothered to complete the five minute process but certainly significant. Because this time last year the Salford Green Party hardly existed.
Salford and Eccles candidate, Emma Van Dyke, and Worsley and Eccles South candidate, Chris Bertenshaw, were two new Green Party members who joined around that time, with established member David Jones, who is now the candidate for Blackley and Broughton...
"It's fair to say that at the first meeting we went to there was us three staring at each other, that's how ineffective it was, and now we've got over 150 members" says Chris "It's made ridiculous progress."
Now, not only are the Greens standing in all three Salford Parliamentary constituencies, they are also standing in all wards for the local elections, with every Green member up for election living in Salford.
"This last twelve months it has escalated" says David "We're going to build it and be the alternative party. This is a very old traditional Labour stronghold but when we're knocking on doors it's very positive. We're not expecting a breakthrough this time but we hope within twelve or 18 months..."
With the Salford LibDems in meltdown there's certainly a vacuum for alternative votes to the mainstream parties. So who are these three candidates and what are the issues they will be highlighting for Salford?
"I was born and bred in Broughton and saw Salford change when Thatcher came in, in the early 80s" says David Jones (Blackley and Broughton) "It just nosedived in certain areas, ghettoised and never really got back. We had Thatcher and Major, then Labour got in and it was a false dawn as far as I was concerned. They stopped the onslaught from the Tories but they never turned it back.
"My father was a bus driver and we lived in a nice house with a mortgage" he adds "The guy two doors down was a postman, and another neighbour worked in a chemist shop, and we could all afford mortgages and to live. But now if you work in a shop or are a bus driver or a postman you've got no chance. They're constantly trying to take off that little bit that you have, like putting VAT up, reducing tax for those who can afford it and taking it off those who can't pay. It's constant drip, drip, drip over decades and all that needs to be reversed.
"In Broughton there are people in absolute dire poverty; through no fault of their own they've not got enough to live on, and then two years ago they brought in the Bedroom Tax and it's absolutely crippling people" he explains "If you're on £74 a week and they say `Right we're going to charge you £15 Bedroom Tax' - that's a 20% tax on everything you've got. If they did that to the whole nation there'd be civil war! Now the Tories are looking to add it on for pensioners as well, but they always do it gradually and it builds and builds and builds...how far do things have to go?"
David talks about getting rid of Job Seekers Allowance and replacing it with a Citizen's Income, which guarantees everyone in the country a minimum income of £75 which, he says, will abolish the benefit trap because that amount stays even when you're in work. He talks about the "re-instatement of the NHS rather than the privatisation under Tories and Labour" and a referendum on Europe, "to stay in a more democratic Europe...
"A lot of our policies boil down to having democracy at the closest level to the people rather having things dictated from the top" he explains "We want to get things to the local level, to give local councillors and authorities the power that they should have, rather than have it all taken away by national government."
In Salford, he believes, the Council "has issues with democracy...there seems to be a cabal of deputy mayors and the Mayor who dictate everything to lobby fodder, and it needs addressing...
"We're not beholden to big corporate sponsors or big trade unions, or whims of multimillionaires like UKIP, we don't have that" he adds "We are governed by our members regardless of how much they pay in. It's very democratic; everyone has the same say in how our policies are developed."
For Chris Bertenshaw (Worsley and Eccles South), the priority is "to do as much re-nationalisation as possible...there's a culture of privatising everything which means that the public transport here is horrendous" he says "Trying to improve it in misguided ways has made it like that. The Crescent in the morning is horrendous."
And for Emma Van Dyke (Salford and Eccles) the priority is energy, climate change and the anti-fracking movement which has raised the Green Party profile in Salford, thanks to its big involvement at the Barton Moss protests..."People have been directly affected by that and come to us" she says.
Indeed, while the Green Party has seen a fourfold increase in its membership nationally, in Salford it's been a sixfold increase.
"I think it's important that people vote for policies that they actually want, rather than be too concerned about following the party that they've always voted for in the past" says Chris, urging Salford people to go to that Vote For Policies website and find their party.
For those who have done the survey, certainly a majority in Blackley and Broughton have found that the Green Party comes top.
Candidates standing in the Genral Election (that we know of)
Blackley and Broughton
David Jones –Green Party
Graham Stringer –Labour Party
Richard Gadsden –Liberal Democrats
Martin Power – UKIP
Michelle Tanfield-Johnson –Conservative Party
Salford and Eccles
Charlie Briggs - Liberal Democrats
Greg Downes - Conservative Party
Rebecca Long-Bailey - Labour Party
Emma Van Dyke - Green Party
Sam Clark – Pirate Party
Mark `Bez' Berry – We Are The Reality Party
Noreen Bailey – Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC)
Worsley and Eccles South
Steven North –Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC)
Kate Clarkson –Liberal Democrats
Geoffrey Berg –Independent
Barbara Keeley –Labour Party
Chris Bertenshaw –Green Party
Iain Lindley –Conservative Party
Owen Hammond – UKIP
See also previous Salford Star articles on alternative parties standing in the General Election...
The Pirate Party – click here
We Are The Reality Party – click here
Trade Union and Socialist Coalition – click here
*The Vote For Policies website doesn't include the We Are The Reality Party, TUSC or the Pirate Party
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