Can you vote for politicians who won’t answer your questions? – Inside Croydon

CROYDON ELECTION QUESTIONS

For this general election, Inside Croydon provided a platform for candidates from across the political spectrum, across the borough’s four constituencies. The same questions, their answers to be widely published.
But some of the candidates – people who want your votes in tomorrow’s general election – have refused to answer your questions.

Which begs a question for you, the voters of Croydon: can you trust these people with your vote?

In the 1990s, when a high-profile political figure failed to appear as agreed for a taping of the satirical current affairs quiz, I have news for you, the producers have the “empty chair” on the culprit, sticking a tub of lard on the desk instead of the politician to symbolize the politician’s uselessness.

But this reluctance to answer questions has also extended to aspiring politicians, even experienced MPs, who are waiting for you to vote for them tomorrow. No questions…

Inside Croydon reported earlier in the campaign about how some candidates sidestepped and sidestepped all public scrutiny by taking voters’ votes for granted. You can read their political messages on their leaflets, but woe betide you if you want to ask a question about politics.

Those (mostly Labor candidates) contesting seats with anticipated large majorities have avoided public sales. There were plenty of selfies with sycophants and grinning supporters – often mainly their own party councillors, with far fewer activists than in previous elections – but little evidence of real engagement with the public, with voters.

It may just be that in the 21st century, in an age of Twitter and TikTok and 24-hour news feeds, we have seen the last of the electoral action as we know it. It was a notable feature across the country that politicians from Labor and the Conservatives, usually the two main contenders for any seat, opted out of the blast, rendering the event rather pointless.

At the beginning of the campaign, Inside Croydon put a set of questions, some suggested by our readers, to a range of candidates in Croydon.

Chris Philp, Conservative MP for Croydon South since 2015, told us he would have a look and get back to us. He never did. Which is a shame.

Sarah Jones, the Labor candidate in the new seat of Croydon West, who was previously the MP for Croydon Central since 2017, has not responded to any of our emails or messages, she has never returned our phone calls.

From his depth: the best campaigning ben taylor could come up with is the uncut council grass his labor colleagues bankrupted

And when I ditched Jones, I tackled her party colleague Ben Taylor, officially the worst Croydon local election Labor candidate in history. Taylor didn’t have the common decency to respond.

Are these candidates for political office incapable of answering a few questions?

They are afraid?

“I’d get a complete blow from within the party if I took part in the poll,” one Red or Blue candidate told us.

Inside Croydon repeatedly described how Steve Reed, a dominant figure in right-wing Labor politics in London, had unsuccessfully threatened us with libel warrants and was party to attempts to hack this site after our investigative reports found that a company run by David. Evans, now General Secretary of the Labor Party, had received £200,000 worth of council contracts from his colleagues in Croydon, and after we persistently reported the failings of the likes of Tony Newman, Alison Butler and Paul Scott and their role in the bankruptcy of this neighborhood.

However, these people now rely on public support – your support – to be elected to the House of Commons. Reed and Jones were there as the collapse of the council’s finances, while City Hall was run by their colleagues, unfolded in front of them. They said and did nothing.

Under pressure: Tory Philp was out on national TV again this week and was as unconvincing as ever

Labor fielded several candidates in Croydon who were not directly involved in the council’s financial collapse – Natasha Irons in Croydon East and Taylor in Croydon South. But neither was prepared to answer questions about their party’s role in destroying this neighborhood.

Not that conservatives are much better. In Croydon East they have Jason Cummings, a councilor who has increased council tax by 21% from May 2023. While Philp has been part of successive Tory governments that have imposed austerity on Croydon and local authorities across the country, causing levels increasing difficulties. , as we all pay more to get less.

So it was a shame that none of these culprits were prepared to make themselves available for a few open-ended questions.

Q Why should we trust you or your party?

This was the question which Newsnight’s Victoria Derbyshire put on Chris’s ‘Congo’ shortly after demonstrating Question time that his understanding of the geography of Central Africa was a bit poor, even as he continued to support the expulsion of migrants to Rwanda. Or is it Congo?

Bomb disposal: LibDem Richard Howard (centre) defused the bombs as Tory Philp bombarded the economy

It’s a question worth asking Philp again, given his unfortunate role in collapsing the British economy under Thick Lizzy Truss’ mini-budget, seeing mortgage payments rise for thousands in Croydon and across the country.

There was an interesting contrast between the candidates this week. One of Philp’s rivals, Major Richard Howard, who represents the LibDems in Croydon South, released a video about his time working on the front line in a war zone for the British Army as a bomb disposal expert. Unlike Philp, who put a bomb under the British economy.

All candidates have seen our questions. Perhaps this was a question Jones felt unable to answer given Labour’s role in the council’s financial collapse.

As for Taylor, who at the previous local election tried to mislead the electorate by claiming to be from South Croydon when he lives in Coulsdon, that was probably an integrity issue he would struggle to answer. Taylor was introduced to local politics by Labor councilor Jamie Audsley, who was deselected by Newman’s Numpties because of his support for a directly elected mayor. Taylor stumbled unscathed from the wreckage of that one.

Q What is the most important issue for you in this general election?

No hard questions: Sarah Jones was elected in 2017 on a wave of Corbynmania. He is now a fully dedicated Starmerit

For Labour, this election is not about people. It’s all about power, at any cost.

Who knows what the answer to that question might be, from Taylor (who seems oblivious to the fact that the council has run out of money) or Jones, since Labor seems to have abandoned all their principles, all the promises of leader Keir Starmer and almost anything can be recognized as a “labour policy”.

Q After 14 years of austerity, local councils, social care, local services in England are in a state of collapse. Including here in Croydon. What would you and your party do to fix Croydon?

Again, no response from Philp – who has been part of the Tory austerity machine for nearly a decade – nor from Taylor or Jones, whose Labor Party has no extra spending planned to help the dozens of local councils in financial crisis, to avoid imminent emergency in adult social care or to provide essential local services that people depend on.

Under a Starmer Labor government, it will be more of the same.

Q What will you do to improve education in our schools and for our students?

Philp, Taylor, Jones: no response.

Q Brexit?

This is the question the Tories and Labor are trying to avoid answering. Neither offers any solution to the greatest act of self-harm in this country’s history.

Q Gaza?

Tens of thousands of civilians, including children and women, have been maimed or killed in the nine-month attack by the Israel Defense Forces.

Power play: many of the candidates in tomorrow’s general election do not want to be held to account for their part in destroying Croydon and the country.

The candidates in tomorrow’s election – Philp, Taylor and Jones – represent the political parties that not only supported Israel’s military action against Gaza, which many see as war crimes, but in November those parties voted against a call for a humanitarian ceasefire.

No wonder they don’t want to be held accountable.

You may have had a few individual questions as well.

For Sarah Jones we could have asked…

Q Why did you say and do nothing when your party colleagues were bankrupting the neighborhood?

Or

Q What happened to your party’s 2021 suspensions of Tony Newman and Simon Hall because of the council’s financial collapse?

Or

Q What do you expect to be the outcome of the Metropolitan Police’s investigation into allegations of computer fraud over Labour’s selection of a candidate in your old constituency which is now Croydon East?

For Chris Philp, we could have asked:

Q What’s it like being the conservatives’ punching bag on TV and radio? Don’t you have self respect?

And for Ben Taylor, we could have asked:

Q Does the Labor Party have a problem with black people, as the Forde Report suggested?

And Inside Croydon will continue to ask the tough questions, the ones that those who want your votes don’t want to answer.

Croydon Election Past Questions:

Claire Bonham, Liberal Democrat, Streatham and Croydon North
Mark Samuel, Independent, Croydon South
Peter Underwood, Green, Croydon East

For more information on where to vote on the 4th of July and who you’re running for in the election, use our widget here:

Find election information at
WhoCanIVoteFor.co.uk

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• ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: In January 2024, Croydon was named among the country’s most rotten boroughs for the seventh consecutive year in the annual summary of civic advertising in Private magazine