Last night I had my first opportunity to meet Labour members in Derby North. I had a really nice evening, and spent two and half hours talking to members about different issues, learning what they are looking for in a candidate and what issues are important to them. Sadly, as is often the case everywhere across the UK, local Labour membership has fallen. But a good few people turned out yesterday and that was a good sign (considering Derby County were playing a match at the same time!).

The next stage of the process is the short-listing, and the results should be known by December 18th. I’m very much looking forward to returning to Derby to talk to more members. My letter to every member in the constituency is going in the post today, which will add to the rather large pile of reading materials that the poor Derby North members have for this weekend! There were 15 candidates in total last night, including some very impressive competition from around the country.

Ultimately, if Derby North is to stay Labour at the next election, and at the moment that isn’t a certainty, Derby North needs to get out the sizeable youth vote in the area. Derby is a university city so there are large numbers of young people who have the option to vote. I’m standing as the young candidate in order to capture that vote, as well as the votes of older people. Philippa Latimer pointed out a couple of days ago that only 37% of 18-24 year olds voted at the 2005 general election, compared to 48% for the next age group up. If the difference between losing the seat could be 0.5-1% of the vote, then getting a few hundred more 18-24 year olds to the ballot box could make all the difference.