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And so here’s an update on how the local political landscape at Herne Hill *really* looks, once you have taken into account the admission by our friends at @Lambeth Labour of making up the data.

Many thanks to @adrianshort of the excellent @mashthestate for kindly making available to the SE24 electorate a more representative graph using the correct data.

You may remember how @JimDicksLambeth and his Herne Hill @LambethLabour lot were spreading the fear of vote Green, get the Tory bogeyman. The @LambethLabour leaflets showed a similar graph to the one above, except showing Labour to have 45% share of the vote, the Tories a laughable 40% and @LambethLibDems on 15%.

History had been re-written by @LambethLabour, with the 36.7% picked up by the party at the previous local elections [pdf] somehow not appearing anywhere on the SE24 radar.

Meanwhile, it saddens me to see the fine @ChukaUmunna (or at least someone very close to the Streatham Labour PPC) seemingly getting up to a similar trick down in SW16.

I rather like left of centre Chuka, but I don’t like the way his campaign team is putting across a slur of vote LibDem, get the Tory bogeyman.

The rather fine @iwrotethis in Streatham has uploaded Chuka’s latest election leaflet. I was shocked to see LibDem @Chris4Streatham stuck on a poor third place showing, with only 13% of the vote.

The Labour party in Streatham has mysteriously attributed the data to:

“Latest constituency voting figures.”

Latest form where exactly? The 29% share of the Tory vote, and the 13% LibDem showing certainly doesn’t match up with the previous general election, where ultra Blairite Keith Hill polled 46.7%, with the LibDems second on 28.3%.

Ah, I see…

The Labour party in Streatham (and I truly hope Chuka isn’t the main man behind this) has rather cheekily used data from the first choice preferences in the 2008 elections for the London Assembly, across *all* of Lambeth and Southwark. The LibDems did trail in third, but remember the only realistic choice two years ago was Ken Vs Boris. The LibDems didn’t get a look in.

Naughty, naughty, Chuka - using the election results for a different contest, held in a different patch and taking place two years ago, is hardly the “latest constituency voting figures.”

Still, at least it isn’t as bad as the downright lies being spun out by @LambethLabour back in Herne Hill and the admission by @JimDicksLambeth that the Herne Hill graph is:

“…an illustration of our view of the respective strengths of the three main national parties in this area.”

Which is Nu Labour speak for telling a pack of lies.

And so many thanks to @adrianshort for providing the proper Herne Hill graph, and also for giving me the heads up on @JimDicksLambeth. It seems that the current @LambethLabour Councillor has past form of political dirty tricks.

Smear the Greens, smear the LibDems, get… the Labour bogeyman?

False information in election leaflets is an issue that is not only making headlines nationally. Here in Lambeth and the local Labour party is publishing literature in Herne Hill that is quite frankly, a pack of lies.

With two sitting @LambethLabour Councillors, and one Green party Councillor, SE24 has become something of a political battleground as the borough decides who will govern at Lambeth Town Hall.

@LambethLabour needs this lone Green seat to counteract the @LambethLibDems surge. The Greens meanwhile have recognised that their share of just under 37% of the vote in 2006, suggests that the electorate in Herne Hill is sympathetic to the Green message.

Ah yes - about that 36.7% share of the vote that the Greens managed to achieve back at the last local election. If you are in possession of an election leaflet put out by the much hyped #labourdoorstep team in Herne Hill, you could be forgiven for thinking that the Green’s fine performance four years ago was simply a political mirage.

Even keen to re-write political history, @LambethLabour has produced a highly misleading graph. Nu Labour feature (45%), as do the LibDems (40%) and even the Tories (15%) - the Greens are nowhere to be seen in the vision for Herne Hill, as fantasised by @LambethLabour.

Which is all a bit strange, seeing as though the @LambethLabour leaflet headlines states: “Two Horse Race in Herne Hill,” with the overt suggestion that a vote for the Greens is a meaningless vote.

Green Councillor Thackray was elected with more votes in 2006 than any of the @LambethLabour candidates. A whopping great big political lie is currently dropping through the letterboxes in Herne Hill.

I emailed Councillor Dickson, one of the current @LambethLabour Cllr’s for the ward, as well as the current Cabinet Member for Finance and Resources. With such a prestigious (and well paid) position, one would hope that the good Councillor has a fine head for figures:

“I am researching and writing a news story on the Labour election leaflets in Herne Hill. The Greens are taking issue with the claim that Labour has 45% of the vote, the Conservatives 40% and the LibDems 15%.

Please can you confirm where the figures came from, and why the Green vote of 36.7% at the last local election doesn’t appear in the leaflet.”

I appreciate that is must be a busy time for any local Councillor seeking re-election (especially so with the pesky Green vote of 36.7% giving you a bit of a headache…) - but no response from Councillor Dickson as yet.

Ever keen to find the missing 36.7% of the Green vote in Herne Hill, I turned instead to the political party that appears to have been whitewashed out of Lambeth politics.

John Hare is one of the Green candidates for the Herne Hill ward. He very kindly agreed to give me his take on the misleading @LambethLabour leaflet, as well as look ahead, with hopefully a positive agenda for the borough.

As John admits in the audioboo below, the fabrication of the figures by @LambethLabour leaves his party in a tricky position when trying to convert the good people of Herne Hill to the Green cause.

To make an issue of the @LambethLabour lies is to possibly appear as mudslinging. It’s a difficult dilemma, and one that has wholly been created by the Nu Labour party in the borough, with the aim of making political capital out of the propaganda being published.

John was able to offer a response given from Councillor Dickson regarding the data that has appeared out of nowhere. @LambethLabour has told the Greens that the graph is:

“…an illustration of our view of the respective strengths of the three main national parties in this area.”

Which is Nu Labour speak for saying we simply made the figures up.

I was horrified to hear this. It is not illegal to tell lies in election literature. If @LambethLabour has admitted that false information has been published in the leaflets, what else is open to scrutiny?

The public consultation regarding the mutualisation of local government? The allegation that @LambethLibDems want to legalise kerb crawling? Free swimming for every resident?

John didn’t want to become embroiled in the whole seedy matter of @LambethLabour mudslinging, but to remain silent would be a betrayal of the electorate in Herne Hill. Vote Green, get Tories, appears to be the rally cry from @LambethLabour.

Um, not so

If the election results from 2006 are any indicator, vote Green, get rid of the Councillor who admits that the figures in a political leaflet have been made up, would seem more likely.

Meanwhile I rather enjoyed my afternoon of tea and political chat with John Hare. The Green candidate was keen to put over the policies of his party, something that has been missing from @LambethLabour in Herne Hill.

John is a realist, not a liar. He recognises that the Greens won’t hold political power in Lambeth come May 7th, but he is hopeful of building upon the first Green seat won back in 2006.

With both Herne Hill and Brixton Hill being central to the Green campaign, John confirmed that if elected, the Green Councillors in Lambeth would refuse to enter into coalition with any political party. Voting and support (or lack of it) would be positioned in line with local Green policy.

I recognised John’s observation that Nu Labour in Lambeth is now nothing but an election fighting machine. I supported his observation that the role of the Greens in Lambeth is to be the conscience of @LambethLabour (even if I got my words a little tongue twisted at the end.)

So yeah, lies, damn lies and @LambethLabour lies. And we didn’t even get round to talking about Lambeth Life…