Pudsey Constituency Labour Party welcomed Shadow Minister Chris Williamson (MP for Derby North and Shadow Minister for Fire and Emergency Services) to a packed meeting at St James the Great Church, Woodhall.
Pudsey is marginal seat, with Conservative MP Stuart Andrew’s majority cut to 331 in May’s election.
Mr Williamson was invited to speak of his experience in winning a key marginal seat. He won Derby North in 2010 with a majority of just 631, before losing it in 2015 by 41 votes, and winning it back in the 2017 election with a majority of over 2,000.
As well as his experience at the last election, Mr Williamson also spoke about the current sense of purpose and energy within the party, how he felt the manifesto returned the party to common-sense socialism and Jeremy Corbyn’s message to change the balance of power in the country to the many, not the few.
He then took questions from the floor about issues including the greenbelt and the public sector pay cap.
Peter Carlill, chair of the local Calverley and Farsley branch said:
“It’s great to see how much the shadow cabinet care about the people of Pudsey following Jeremy’s visit to Swinnow during the election, and now Chris’ visit to Woodhall – and we hope to see more high profile visits in the coming months.
“In the 2017 election we saw the highest turnout in Pudsey since the 90s and Woodhall in particular saw the biggest swing to Labour in the constituency so it was great to be out on the doorstep again – as we have been every week since the election – thanking people who voted Labour, listening to people’s concerns and letting them know what we’re doing to make sure their vote counts.”
Excellent meeting in Pudsey this afternoon before talking to local people on #labourdoorstep in campaign to #unseat Tory MP who has 331maj pic.twitter.com/EA8NJ90vFO
— Chris Williamson MP (@DerbyChrisW) October 14, 2017
A Facebook live video of the visit can be watched here.