On 24 January 2015 I was selected by members of the Cheltenham Labour Party to be their candidate in the General Election.
It was not what I expected to happen. I expected to lose. Part of me hoped to lose, but the following 104 days of campaigning up to election night on 7 May have changed my life.
In the nineteen-seventies I was shy, thin as a rake and a teenager who was a little bit frightened of everything. However it was at Kingdown Comprehensive School in rural Warminster, Wiltshire that something changed . It was the beginning of the opening of my mind and realising that learning was something I could do quite well. Mum and dad were wonderfully encouraging although my grandmother once memorably warned my mum that “no good will come of spending all that time with his head in books”.
It was about this time that I started to spend a lot of time with my dear granddad. We used to walk around his garden together talking about steam engines (he was a retired train driver) and I happily stood for hours in his shed listening to his funny stories. But some of his stories were not funny; they were about being a boy my age in a world before the National Health Service, when children like me left school at 14 and when having no money could break people and break-up families.
Then one day he shared a worry he had about me. He worried I might do all this study and move away. Not just move away, but that I would forget that I had a granddad like him. He worried that my family might not be good enough for me.
That day I made him a promise. I would never EVER feel like that and I would always remember his story. I told him that one day I would be a Labour politician and I would make sure that the people he worried about would be the people I would worry about too. It was a bold promise for a 15 year old boy and it took me 38 years to fulfil it.
So, there I was on 24 January 2015 in the Oakley Community Centre in Cheltenham, age 53, no longer thin as a rake, but still more than a little bit frightened. This was selection day.
After a morning of presentations, discussions and questions I congratulated the other candidates. They were credible and knew policy, were erudite and active. I was a middle-aged lawyer who had not been to a meeting since I was a student. I had only recently left the governing board of the Cheltenham Ladies’ College and I was not good on policy details. I was absolutely certain it could not be me and I wished whoever won a great campaign.
Then Malcolm Bride, chairman of the Labour Party in Cheltenham, announced the result of the vote. “With more than 50% of the votes, Paul it is you!”
My first thought, frankly, was “shit, that is not in the plan”, and then my mind raced as I knew I had some serious explaining to do at home and at work! The rest of the day I spent in shock. People have said that surely I had thought it was a possibility that I might win, but it had genuinely never crossed my mind. I was doing this to honour my granddad, I had not thought about winning even for a second.
Malcolm told me to go home and rest, the next 100 days or so would be quite busy.
If you will indulge me I would like to take you though those 100 days and reflect on the lessons I have learned. I would like to share with you what it is like to be a hopeless candidate and what an empowering, enriching and humbling experience it has been. I will explain the leadership principles I took from so many inspirational people, how the Daily Mail ruined one particular day, but above all how in the end the whole experience mattered more than I could ever have imagined on 24 January 2015.
Labour doesn’t win seats like Cheltenham; in 2010 we had 2700 votes and scraped holding our deposit. The Labour Party regional hierarchy doesn’t encourage campaigning in seats like Cheltenham, instead they want activists to campaign in neighbouring winnable seats. Cheltenham does not get the support of a paid strategist, no special funding and no A-list visitors for photo-calls. In effect, in seats like Cheltenham, it is a contest for Labour in name only.
My close team was Malcolm and the redoubtable Clive Harriss, my agent. We sat down for a beer and we hatched a modest plan. Of course we could not win, but how could we make a difference? I still had a job to manage and we had no money so making a difference would have to be something that was targeted and thoughtful. There were 100 days to the election and the effort would have to be made quickly as well.
We had four levers to make a difference: 1) There would be several hustings (public meetings); 2) I was given a weekly column in the Gloucestershire Echo; 3) I could meet local people of influence and finally 4) we could deliver leaflets to the good people of Cheltenham. However every other candidate had the same opportunities so we would need to be smart about what we did as well.
In Cheltenham Martin Horwood was the sitting MP of ten years standing, a good reputation for hard work and local activism and a sizeable majority. Alex Chalk was fighting his first election for the Conservative Party, a very well-funded campaign that had started early and was going to make a significant challenge to Martin. Then there were four minor candidates; an Independent, a Green and a candidate for UKIP, plus me. Back in the early days of my campaign I assessed that Martin and Alex would be fighting a close battle to win and that between the minor candidates UKIP would be strong and the Green vote would be strong too. I hoped we would keep our deposit. I didn’t want to share any personal targets as it would look vain and self-serving, but after the first hustings meeting when I met the other candidates for the first time I wrote a note to myself.
“UKIP may be too strong for us, hard to read how they will do here, but beating UKIP would be a GREAT result, she is a very pleasant woman in conversation, but her policy positions jar so much. The Green candidate is brilliant. He is passionate and confident, but humble too. No shame in losing to him. The Independent candidate is a lovely man who I can learn from, but I don’t think he will get enough votes to worry us”.
Here was my first lesson in leadership, to learn from your opponents. Their strengths and their weaknesses helped me to define my role. I learnt a great deal from each candidate, mostly positive things, but as a précis these were the important points I noted about the other candidates:
Alex, Conservative, was always impeccably prepared, but sometimes struggled to be spontaneous. A good man who hid a little behind his brief.
Martin, LibDem, should have had a very positive story about local achievement, but never seemed to explain well enough what he had done and was over-reliant on asserting his personal qualities.
Christina, UKIP, was often charming in conversation, but could not be herself when presenting points. It felt that others were giving her their words to say. It felt uncomfortable.
Adam, Green, was so articulate and passionate, but perhaps did not reach out to people who were not already supporting him.
Richard, Independent, was a brave and fearless campaigner, but with a message that was a little too safe and which didn’t offer enough of an alternative.
From each I could learn and from each I learnt a lot. They were good people.
My second lesson in leadership was to be myself. I was going to be exposed to scrutiny and challenge. Hundreds, even thousands of people would have the chance to publicly disagree with me. Each of the other candidates would be out to show that I was wrong.
Of course I might fail being myself, but I would definitely fail trying to be someone else.
Failing because you are not good enough is not going to be pleasant, but failing because you have hidden what you believe and carried a less authentic message is deceiving yourself and your supporters.
My approach therefore was formulated early on. I wanted to be myself. I am used to speaking in public, but with my own message. I knew I would be less effective, less authentic, trying to be relentlessly on-message with Labour policies. I therefore spoke off-the-cuff, about things that mattered to me and about values, not about policies. I wanted to be completely honest, so I said publically I could not win and talked about my shortcomings and those of past Labour administrations. I did so not to undermine our chances, but to properly engage. You cannot ask people to believe you if you have not acknowledged your own weaknesses. I wanted to be positive all of the time, not just when it suited me. I praised candidates for points I agreed with and praised their qualities as candidates when I did not agree with their positions.
My third lesson in leadership is that there is more wisdom in conversation than there ever will be in presentation. All the political parties want to present. Every day was an unremitting barrage of materials that are presented, not debated. I am an enthusiast for politics, but even I found it impossible to engage sometimes. No one has a monopoly on making good decisions, no one can invent perfect, but in conversation we learn, we reflect and we engage. One of the absolute joys of the campaign was the opportunity to meet people and talk. I had meetings with headmasters, with charity workers, with voluntary organisations, with journalists… It was often humbling, it could be inspiring and it was frequently something that left me feeling helpless. The challenge therefore was to truly listen. To truly listen is to learn from what you have heard and in learning to act.
This brings me to my fourth lesson in leadership. It is to act. Do something. I felt that I had to act on some things even if not strictly part of my brief. I do not want to share too much in this article because it will sound self-serving, but deciding to act does not have to be a grand gesture. It might be a small targeted financial contribution, it might be giving some time, it might be a thoughtful hand-written note or phone call, and it might be committing to meet again, writing again, offering support. It might be a hug. The key however is that you act on what you have heard. To act validates the time of the people you meet, it respects their contribution and it brings you closer to being useful.
I was often asked “Why are you standing when you cannot win?” I found it an easy question to answer. Labour could not win in May 2015, but what if we had a ten year or even a twenty year plan to elect an MP? It could start now. Winning long term meant being credible now and creating a platform to build on. If we could also make a difference now, wouldn’t that be an amazing start?
I also sometimes used a football analogy. I said that if you support a football team it is support through thick and thin. It is support whether you rate the centre forward or the manager, win, lose or draw. Supporting Labour in Cheltenham was important to those who were “fans”. We supported labour through thick and thin. I thought it a neat analogy, but one day it got me into a lot of trouble.
The Daily Mail got hold of a video clip of me making the point and ran the story that I was criticising the Leadership of the Party. I look back now and I could make the point that I was just being honest and that events subsequently proved me right, but that would be dishonest; I wasn’t trying to criticise Ed Miliband I was just being clumsy. This was my fifth lesson in leadership, being myself was the best approach for me and for our campaign, but it was not faultless and it was an approach which carried inherent weakness. I made a stupid mistake having got a little bit carried away with how being “myself” was my strength. It was a strength, but I overdid it and it became my weakness.
It was salutary. The severe telling-off I got from the regional party was not the worst of it. I felt I had let down my team and that was close to heart-breaking. As it turned out my team were not so displeased to see some national publicity for Labour in Cheltenham! We rallied round and we moved on.
My sixth and final lesson in leadership is about my team. I have mentioned Malcolm and Clive already, they are now firm friends, but so are others, too many to mention all by name; and herein lies the most important lesson for me of the whole experience. By the end of the campaign with no funding, no paid for strategist or administrator we had done a remarkable thing. We had hand-delivered over 20,000 leaflets with a volunteer team that grew from three or four to nearly twenty. We connected with hundreds of people, may be thousands, it was a joy. We could not win, but we could make a difference. It was my responsibility as the candidate to ensure I respected the contribution of my team and to maximise the difference we could make.
As I did more so they grew with me. In the end I am uncertain if I was responding to them or they were responding to me. It was, I repeat, a joy.
A leader who is diffident is disrespecting their team. A leader who judges that he or she cannot win and plays it lightly or frivolously has no place being called a leader.
It is the leader’s role to represent, to challenge and to be the best he or she can be. It is their duty to optimise the opportunity for their team to make a difference. Winning is never a guaranteed outcome, trying to be the best we can be for our team is achievable all of the time. I do not mean that a leader must simply do the team’s bidding, but when there is a shared endeavour, where we have common purpose, the leader must do all he or she can. Leadership is founded on trust. It is the gift of trust from team to leader that is so precious; a trust that when it is honoured and then repaid ensures we can all achieve more.
It was a privilege to be their candidate. I am proud beyond words, but I will be always grateful. I could not imagine that I would learn so much. I did not envisage how inspired I would feel. I could not hope to be with better people. My team accepted my weaknesses, we campaigned together and we grew together. I am certain we have started something special and I know it will be better for what we have done.
What of the result? As we know Labour nationally had its worst night for 23 years. There were brilliant and deserving candidates who lost and no-one foresaw the Conservatives winning so clearly. In Cheltenham however we did ok. We increased our vote by 44%, we had a positive swing and amazingly we came third to beat UKIP.
#GE2015 result for Cheltenham
In the grand scheme of political endeavour, of course, none of this matters. It is just a statistical footnote. As my grandmother used to say, the sea does not get wetter for a drop a rain.
What really matters in anything we do is whether we make a difference.
The true lesson of leadership surely is that we change things for the better. If one thing is a little easier, a little more certain or a little better for things we do, we can be called leaders. I am happy that we did this. I am proud we did this and I feel privileged that I was part of a team that wanted to do this.
Finally, thank you granddad, thank you for your inspiration; you were a great man and I loved you very much.
Paul Gilbert, Chief Executive LBC Wise Counsel
May 2015
