 Victory!Successful Green candidate David Howell fills us in on his victorious mock election campaignMix three different shades of red. Add blue, yellow and green paint, ensuring that they are totally different in how they are manufactured. Wait for explosion. Present in front of an audience approaching 2,000.
Hey presto – you have a mock election.
This heady mix produced a noise to rival any produced in a football stadium. In fact, this election had all the intrigue, complexity and passion of a promotion battle. But who would be ‘going up’?
Fortunately, a bit of noise and passion did the job. A large dose of noisy rallies to go alongside the school assemblies, pushing the Green agenda in a manner as animated as Delia Smith’s now-legendary half-time speech, ensured there were plenty of chants of ‘Go Green Party!’ or words to that effect ringing around the school.
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I knew the decibel count put me ahead – but decibels are not votes. Fortunately, crosses in boxes are. And 383 of them were placed with Beckhamesque accuracy into the Green Party slot, enough for a majority of 31. Cue raised right arm a lá Shearer, noisy victory speech – and delirium.
I stood for the Green Party, pushing an agenda of outright opposition to the Iraq war and radical action on climate change that was certain to win over the idealists among the electorate. But with Communist, Conservative, Liberal Democrat, Labour and Socialist candidates as well, there was plenty of competition for the votes of the ordinary students who had never known how fun politics could be – until now.
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