Facing Uncomfortable Realities

[Note: The 2022 UK local Council elections will conclude on May 5th. The quote cited was published last week in a local paper The News, Portsmouth. These elections are local, not national, and are unlikely to shift priorities for the national party in power despite their incompetence, criminality and centralising tendencies. Readers should be aware that the local Fareham Council has previously been dominated by members of the UK’s current governing party — The Conservatives.]

The 2022 local election campaign is a battle between ‘uncomfortable realities and comfortable beliefs’, says former chairman of Fareham’s Liberal Democrats.

Long before these last few weeks of door knocking and leaflet stuffing, the Uncomfortable Realities have been our candidates’ constant message. Sewage. Foodbanks. Poverty. Affordable Housing. Air Quality. A Climate Catastrophe. Diminished Trust. A broken democracy failing a broken Brexit-battered economy.

Come next Thursday evening the campaigns will be over. Exhausted candidates will know that nothing more can be said, no more doors to knock, no leaflets left to push through letterboxes, no more phones to be called — but Uncomfortable Realities will still need to be faced.

This year we know that folks have listened. Liberal Democrat messages have hit home. Voters and businesses have had enough of poor governance, local or national. The outcome of the battle between uncomfortable realities and comfortable dreams/assumptions will be evident the day after tomorrow. Put simply, the blunt message from doorsteps is about law and order — ‘Gangsters should not be allowed to govern’ — not nationally, nor locally.

This election is, supposedly, entirely local — a search for community leaders living and working here. A search for people who are prepared to care about the place they call home. It is a search for support and a decent determination to battle against the wreckers motivated by greed and self-gratification. But this battle never ends. The day after the day after tomorrow our LibDem candidates (elected, or not) will still be working in and for their communities — and every day reminding people of the Uncomfortable Realities as a spur to demand better governance and more humane priorities.

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This article is published within Fareham as ‘Bruno’s Blog’ and, here on Medium, is included in the Groupe Intellex list: ‘Portchester — the that place I call home.’