I Vote Labour

Propaganda by the Tory press has been remarkably successful at this election.
Their cynicism disgusts me; the Daily Mail has a history of supporting fascists, notably in the Second World War, yet people still read it and believe what it says.
This is the first year that I have actually campaigned directly since I worked at the Labour Party Headquarters in the 1990s.

The driving force as been the deliberate dismantling of the NHS, who cared for my parents when they were sick and dying, who helped me to bring my daughters into the world and who have looked after the health of me and my loved ones for our entire lives this far.

The way they treated and mended my badly broken elbow last year was incredible, and the dignity that they afforded to every patient that first night in A&E was incredibly moving.

It didn't matter whether you were old, young, rich, poor, male, female, black, white, brown or whatever: the scruffiest young man, the most vulnerable baby, the poshest elderly lady, all got the same respect and gentleness from a team of staff who would utterly shame some of the rich and powerful people who strut about our planet as though it is they who own the place.

The kindest gesture was from the nurse who checked me in first of all; I was convinced that I'd only dislocated it, and got a horrible shock when I saw on the x-ray that the bone had almost completely sheared off. After he put the plaster on, I had to go for more x-rays and he said 'Come and say goodbye when you're finished here'. That was so sweet. I was on my own, and worried and frightened. And I did, and he smiled and wished me luck and a speedy recovery.

Actually, it could have been the theatre team, who were so reassuring when I was a scaredy cat just before the operation to fix it (they sewed it back on, a new procedure that meant I only had to have one operation instead of metal pins that had to be removed later).

Or the chap who was patrolling the recovery room sitting down next to us all, one by one, and reminding us to breathe!

Or perhaps, when they finally signed me off three months later, the message from the surgeon:
'Did she get to her gig?' (I had been raving and ranting: 'I'm a guitarist! I'm a guitarist! I'm a GUITARIST!').

So even if it wasn't the heartbreaking sight of homeless people in tent cities in the bitterly cold wind, food banks (FOOD BANKS!!) in this country in peacetime, or the horrible racism of the Prime Minister, or the deliberately divisive tactics of his government, the NHS alone is enough to have got me out on the streets with leaflets and persuasion.
And my Offsprogs too (I am so proud of them), and so many of my friends.