Council by-election leaflet review

Since 2007, I've been reviewing election leaflets on this blog (there's a list on this page) but this year is the first time I've had 'skin in the game' because I've been out delivering some of them! (ICYMI, I joined Plaid Cymru last month!)

We are having a by-election because one of our four Labour councillors resigned recently. (Probably because of events covered in this rather unpleasant news story that doesn't paint the Cardiff Labour Party in a nice light, and I can understand why she left.) The councillor who resigned is someone I've talked to about problems with a local park being closed, and, on a personal level, I thought she was a good councillor. But she's left a party I feel has been failing Cardiff as a city for a while now. 

And the result is this by-election. So, with just a couple of days left before polling day, here is a run-down and review of the electoral campaign leaflets that I've seen. Looking back at the council election in 2022 and the General Election last year, I didn't do my usual thing of awarding and deducting points. So, I don't feel too hypocritical not doing it this year either. (Obviously, this year, I think everyone should vote for Plaid Cymru.)

I should also point out that not all these leaflets have come through our letterbox. I have been given some of them by other people. It's been fun being in the canvassing WhatsApp group and seeing people sharing different leaflets they have received - usually new ones ended up coming through our door too, so it was a bit spoilery. But that's fine. 

I'm going to assess the leaflets on whether they are bilingual, their 'photo effort' and also the number of dragons or other Welsh symbols that appear on leaflets. The dragon quotient (DQ) is important. I enjoy seeing graphs and 'race' or 'winning' diagrams so will mention them too. I'm also going to sum up their overall message.

I'm going to do this in rough order the leaflets arrived, and first off the mark were Labour. They may have had the advantage because they knew their councillor was resigning, and as they run the council they had some sway over when the election was set. Their 'Grangetown Labour News' and a generic leaflet actually arrived before I knew there was a by-election.

Party: Labour / Llafur

Number of leaflets: 3 (candidate leaflet, Grangetown Labour News, generic Welsh Labour "Delivering for you" leaflet)

Candidate: Khuram Chowdhry (only features on one leaflet)

Photo effort: 1 of Khuram by Grange Gardens; a group shot of Khuram with Labour canvassers. Grangetown Labour News had head shots of the three incumbent Labour councillors who haven't resigned. The generic leaflet had five photos of Eluned Morgan, the First Minister on it. There were also some stock photos and the artist's rendering of what the new Channel View Development will look like, if it's ever finished. It seems to have been stuck in a half-built stage for months. 

Cymraeg: Yes, all 3 leaflets. 

Dragon Quotient: 1, an arty one on Khuram's candidate leaflet

Graphs: none

Overall message: Labour and Khuram say they know what the problems are - parking, litter, antisocial behaviour etc. And they have plans in place to fix it. Although, as they are the party that runs the council, it seems fair to ask why they haven't already put those plans into action and fixed it. There was a nice nod to the community litter-picking group in the newsletter. On the candidate leaflet, Khuram lists a load of things he would like to see happen - things like "protecting our parks and green spaces", when the Labour Council has approved plans to build on a chunk of The Marl, one of Grangetown's few parks. It does feel like all the things he wants to do would put him in direct opposition to most of his fellow Labour councillors. 

Party: Propel

Number of leaflets: 2 (both candidate leaflets)

Candidate: Vincent Yewlett (local guy who runs a business on Clare Road)

Photo effort: 1 candidate photo used on both leaflets, of Vincent stood on Clare Road, 2 different photos of Vincent and Propel party leader, Neil McAvoy, looking at 'problems' - the overgrown river bank and some rubbish strewn streets. Vincent is wearing a Wales retro football top in those photos. 

Cymraeg: both leaflets were bilingual

Dragon Quotient: Propel have a dragon in the logo and Vincent had a dragon on his football shirt in two of the photos, so that's a total of 4 across the leaflets. 

Graphs: none

Overall message: Vincent goes hard on his local status and claims to be the only candidate "walking the streets" of Grangetown. Propel are the "new Welsh alternative", apparently. 

Party: Plaid Cymru

Number of leaflets: 3 (2 candidate leaflets and 1 generic leaflet about how Plaid Cymru will fix NHS waiting lists)

Candidate: Neil Roberts

Photo from delivering the leaflets

Photo effort: 2 different head shots of Neil and a group photo with canvassers next to the bandstand in Grange Gardens. A couple of photos of problems - fly-tipping and a new development that is blocking out light for residents. The NHS leaflet is all stock photos. 

Cymraeg: wrth gwrs!

Dragon Quotient: Plaid Cymru use a daffodil in their logo and it features as an embellishment four times besides the logos. No dragons, though. 

Graphs: 1, showing the recent YouGov national poll that shows Plaid ahead generally in Wales.

Overall message: Neil offers a change from Labour and promises to challenge the Labour run council as "a fresh voice for Grangetown". He also wants to celebrate the diverse communities in Grangetown and challenge divisive rhetoric, with a direct reference to dogwhistle terms used by the Labour Prime Minister recently. Having talked to him, I know Neil wanted to run a positive campaign focusing on his ideas for improving life in the community rather than criticising other parties - a different approach than most of the other leaflets we received.

Party: Green Party

Number of leaflets: 5 (3 candidate leaflets and 2 attack pieces aimed at Labour)

Candidate: Matt Youde (knocked on our door while I was out canvassing; Cathy said he seemed nice)

Photo effort: multiple reuse of two photos taken in Sevenoaks Park (not Grange Gardens for a change) and one of Matt with his arms folded in an alley next to a big pile of fly-tipped waste. Two photos of another chap, who I think is the prospective Senedd candidate in next year's election but it doesn't actually say that. One of the hit pieces has a picture of Kier Starmer - which is one more picture of him than all the Labour leaflets combined. 

Cymraeg: all 5 pieces are bilingual

Dragon Quotient: zero! (Disappointing)

Graphs: a dodgy line graph based on "doorknocking data"; a race showing Labour and the Green runners leaving everyone else behind; a set of results from the last council election that claims Greens placed second, even though the Greens were in an alliance with Plaid Cymru for that election and the result was therefore a vote for both parties.

Technically not true

Also, technically, not entirely true

Overall message: Despite three candidate leaflets, I don't think Matt is offering much different from other candidates. He talks about litter - and, across all five leaflets, that is the only thing mentioned that could be considered an environmental issue. Nothing about the climate at all. Rent caps get mentioned several times. 

However, what is really different about the Greens' campaign is their two hit pieces - one is a letter from a former Labour councillor who has now joined the Greens and the other just says "Punish Labour, Vote Green!" I mean, that's a take, and I'm sure this will appeal to some people who are really angry with Labour but long-term you want to be more than just a protest vote because those don't stick. 

Wanted: angry voters!

Party: None (Independent)

Number of leaflets: 1

Candidate: Ahmed Abdillahi Abdi Samater

Photo effort: 1 candidate photo

Cymraeg: yes

Dragon Quotient: zero

Graphs: none

Overall message: quite positive, but the leaflet is a bit all over the place in terms of topics. Also the text was all centrally aligned and I find that hard to read.

Party: Conservative

Number of leaflets: 1 (given this landed alongside a leaflet for a builder, I suspect this was delivered by a leaflet delivery firm rather than a volunteer)

Candidate: James Hamblin (a Tory I know told me James lives in London but will be a Senedd candidate next year, so this is really just about him being able to say that he ran for the council as part of his Senedd campaign)

Photo effort: pretty decent - six different photos on one A4 double-sided leaflet. Photos of James outside the new central bus station (had he just arrived on a bus?), by the Tramshed venue, with Darren Millar (leader of the Welsh Conservatives), outside the Senedd with Andrew RT Davies (former leader of the Welsh Conservatives), with another guy I don't know possibly outside a pub, and an action shot of him cleaning some graffiti on Virgil Street. They aren't all taken on the same day either, unless he had a change of clothes with him. 

Cymraeg: None (except for the bilingual Welsh Conservatives logo)

Dragon Quotient: Zero

Graphs: none

Overall message: The Conservatives are using the hashtag #fixwales and there is a mix of ideas here, like night buses for Cardiff  and supporting live music venues. But there's some proper bollocks on here about "Labour's war on motorists" and how the Senedd shouldn't be expanded. At the same time as saying "36 more politicians? No thanks!", they are also saying they want a community council for Grangetown, which would be, er, more politicians, wouldn't it? Anyway, this is probably a good insight into the key themes the Tories will be campaigning on for the Senedd next year. 

And the very last leaflet to land on our mat was from...

Party: Reform UK

Number of leaflets: 1

Candidate: Joseph Martin

Photo effort: 1 candidate photo, where, weirdly, he's not looking at the camera.

Cymraeg: ha, ha, ha, no. 

Dragon Quotient: zero

Graphs: none

Overall Message: minimal really. "Cardiff needs Reform" is the slogan. There's a claim that Labour will introduce three week bin collections, which isn't true as far as I'm aware. On the scale of scaremongering, it's picayune stuff, but still it's misleading. I try to be fair in these reviews, even to parties I would never vote for, but there isn't much to say about this. When you have three policy statements and one of them is opposing something that isn't happening, then it's hard not to think it's a deliberate attempt to hoodwink people. 

So, that's the round up. 

Thursday is polling day. If you live near me and are voting, then vote Plaid Cymru!

Wood elves whomp naive Norse (Blood Bowl match report)

Yesterday evening was my monthly Blood Bowl night with Bryan. I took all my teams and he picked to play using the wood elves for the first time. I decided to give my Norse team another go. I'm still a Norse novice and haven't worked out how best to play them, although I have an inkling they just might not be that strong a team.

The wood elves were bolstered by Mosstyn the treeman who gave them a bit of punch in the middle of the park. He also stomped one of my beer boars that had strayed too close to him. It was a complete mismatch and the piggy was properly whomped by him and removed from play. Both my beer boars ended up as casualties, along with both my berserker players who were out of the game before half time. 

Beer boar down!

As in the previous game, most of the Norse heavy hits and ball-in-hand running came from the valkyries. That's partly because they have the 'dauntless' skill, which means they can match up to a much stronger player and initiate attacks on an equal footing. One of my valkyries knocked Mosstyn on his back towards the end of the game, but by then the game was almost over.

It was 0-0 at half time. But the wood elves broke the Norse lines twice at the start of the second half, their high agility players evading the Norse defence. Two successful passes to free-running catchers resulted in two touchdowns, one for each catcher. 

The elves went close a third time, but a pass out of defence by a valkyrie alleviated the pressure. However, the lineman who collected the ball couldn't get the ball over the line. He had an agonisingly few squares left to go when the final whistle went.

Maybe if he'd put his flagon down...

Some final thoughts on playing Norse. Beer boars are cute little figures, but add very little to gameplay. If they were just additional critters on the pitch then they would be worth having, but sacrificing a human player for them is a waste of time. I had a couple of early turns cut short because players fluffed picking up the ball. In hindsight, I would have been better concentrating on blocking the elves when I had a strength advantage in the hope of inflicting some early injuries to unsettle the team. I got very little from my berserkers and would prefer to play with four valkyries instead. They bring a lot more to the game, particularly with the 'dauntless' skill and enhanced catching and passing abilities. 

Final score: Wood elves 2-0 Norse. Winning coach: Bryan. 

Game snacks: Flipz chocolate coated pretzels and Seabrooks spicy paprika Trebles. I don't do snack of the month posts any more, but if I did, I would be recommending the Trebles to everyone. 

Nostalgia is a weapon - football edition

One of the bon mots Douglas Coupland included in his book Generation X is "Nostalgia is a weapon". It's always stuck with me and I've got older it's become more obvious that 'nostalgia' is weaponised by marketing departments, politicians, and by social media. (How many "good old days" posts pop up on your algorithm? Mine is full of 'em.)

Naturally football clubs have got in on the action. Retro shirts have been popular for a while among fans because they are pure nostalgia fuel. Usually retro tops are just done for leisure wear. But this year, Shrewsbury Town's main kit is a throwback to their kit from 40 years ago. 

I feel I am in the nostalgia crosshairs. Because, this was my first ever kit. Here are some pictures of when I was a matchday mascot way back in 1986. It was a typically grey October day with a crowd of less than 3,000 paying supporters.

I was a lucky mascot. Shrewsbury won 4-1 against Grimsby Town. I wore that kit for the rest of the school year in 'games' every Wednesday afternoon in junior school. 

A few years later we discovered the shirt was an almost perfect fit for our beloved family dog, Celyn.

(She was a very patient dog, putting up with this.)

The shirt I wore as a mascot now has pride of place on my office wall, after Cathy got it framed as a surprise present.

I bought the new season's shirt ahead of Shrewsbury's first game of the season at the weekend. I hadn't bought a replica shirt for a few years - I just haven't liked the designs. But this was one I felt I had to buy. 

I went to the match with my two eldest nephews who patiently queued with me in the club shop before the game. They were less patient during the match itself because it was generally dire to watch and frustrating.

But I had a very funny feeling watching the game. For the first time in a long time it really felt like watching Shrewsbury play. It unlocked a primal memory of those first games I went to, when "Shrewsbury Town" was first imprinted on my brain. This is the colour scheme I knew first. 

Other colour combinations have come and gone. But none have stuck with me this strongly. 

One of my nephews has been to several Shrewsbury games, but for the other, this was his first. Maybe he will have the same imprinting experience and for him, this will always be the true colours of Shrewsbury Town. The circle would be complete. 

Giant July - a review of the month

Everyone, meet Darwin. He's a giant tortoise.

I met Darwin on one of my best work days ever, filming behind the scenes at Cotswold Wildlife Park. 

In the same week I visited Warrington to help support team members doing some filming there. The office is very near the Warrington Wolves rugby league stadium. (I took a pic but it's mainly of the car park so I'll spare you.)

Warrington wasn't my only northerly trip this month. Cathy and I went to see comedian Taylor Tomlinson in Manchester. We also had a look round the National Football Museum and met up with Connor. 

No photos allowed during the show

Another "giant" step, at least it feels like it for me, was joining a political party for the first time. I've blogged about becoming a member of Plaid Cymru and am enjoying getting stuck in. I also attended a Yes Cymru protest at the Senedd that was asking for the Crown Estate land in Wales to be devolved to the Welsh Government, to match the situation in Scotland where the Scottish Government has responsibility for it.

In between protests and political canvassing, I also got out on the Keep Grangetown Tidy litter pick (where a couple of lost footballs made it into my latest post about Lost Footballs) and went to the Penarth Model Railway show.

Speaking of footballs... I enjoyed watching the Women's Euros and England's gutsy underdog win. The new football season is starting up and I went to four games, including two trips across the border to see Barry play friendlies in England, Penybont's UEFA Conference League qualifier against Kauno Zalgiris, and Cardiff Draconians' first game in the Cymru South (the Welsh second tier).

Futbology badge!

The Dracs have had to make some improvements to their ground and now have a new "supporter's entrance".

I've also invested in a Dracs season ticket, so you can expect to hear them mentioned quite a few times as the season goes on.

And that was the Euros...

England won it the hard way, didn't they? And being honest, after losing their first game in the group stage, they looked very unlikely winners. In fact, my hunch was Spain would win. 

And yet, and yet, England somehow won all three knockout stage games while only holding a scoreline lead for one minute in six hours of football. Somehow they survived a penalty shoot out where three players in a row missed their spot kicks. Somehow they kept coming back and kept coming back and grubbing wins. Until they lifted the trophy.

My overall feeling is that there is something more heroic in not being the absolute technical best football nation and yet still dragging yourselves over the winning line time and time again. It makes for drama at least. 

And we did have drama. The two goals in three minutes against Sweden, Lucy Bronze strapping herself up like a warrior and then hammering home a penalty in the shoot out, the beyond late equaliser against Italy and the last gasp injury time penalty that won the game, Beth Mead's slip in the shoot out at the end of the final and the missed retake, and then another comeback to win the game and the tournament and the trophy. 

These are all memorable moments from a thoroughly enjoyable tournament. It took 30 games before we saw a 0-0 score-line and that game was settled by a goal in injury time. Compared to the turgid men's tournaments we have had recently, this was non-stop action. 

I may have been a bit dismissive of Cymru's Euros campaign in my previous post about the Euros. One thing that did occur to me was that the women's team have managed something the men's team never did and that is to qualify for a 16 team Euros finals. The men's team first qualified for the finals in 2016 - when there were 24 teams in the competition meaning eight more spaces up for grabs. (Soccer nerds will tell me that Cymru also qualified in 1976 because they were eliminated in the quarter finals, but only four teams appeared in the "finals" that year so quarter finals were effectively the last qualifying round for the finals.)

I asked Cathy what her most memorable moment of the Euros had been and she said Jess Fishlock's goal for Cymru against France. It was super fitting that Jess scored Cymru's first ever goal at a finals tournament, as she has been a superb leader for the Cymru women's team for many years. There was an interview with her dad on the BBC a couple of days later and seeing him trying to keep his emotions in check while on camera brought a lump to my throat. 

Hannah Cain's goal against England was a better goal than Jess's toe poke against France. But it came at the wrong end of a hefty defeat. Although, I still maintain the penalty that set England on their way to victory was a terrible decision. England got very lucky to be gifted the lead there and I think that changed the entire direction of the match. 

I'm not sure what my most memorable moment was. I didn't see Jess Fishlock's goal because I wasn't able to watch the game. I've mentioned some of the England moments already. Germany's Ann-Katrin Berger's incredible save to prevent an own goal against France was an immense display of goalkeeping - possibly one of the best saves I've ever seen in a live televised game. 

The real test of how good a tournament has been is how you feel at the end. I enjoyed England's win. But I also felt sad that the finals were over. It's been brilliant football, engrossing entertainment, nail-bitingly tense, and now... it's over. But always to be remembered as a captivating tournament to watch. 

Yet more post-Jaffa Jaffa Cakes

We are falling a long way down the rabbit hole now. After "cola bottle" flavour last year (which were passable), the latest flavour to hit the shelves is "Hot Honey". 

This isn't some weird unknown company doing this. It's McVities (admittedly now part of some massive conglomerate) who keep pushing the flavour envelope with new random tasting jelly.

So what are hot honey Jaffa Cakes like? They have a sort of honeyish initial taste, but it's hard to tell. Could be fruit. Could be brown sugar. The heat is in a slight zingy chilli pepper aftertaste that lingered for a good 10 seconds or so. The overall effect was, mmm, damp squib, really.

I wouldn't recommend these if you're looking for a packet of Jaffa Cakes to crack open when company comes over. Unless you don't like the prospective company, in which case they would be ideal.

They have conveniently labelled the packet as well, to make sure you don't accidentally give them to someone you like.

Also, McVities are leaning into the biscuit v cake debate with a humorous bar code! (Well I found it funny!)