Ruislip Reshuffle
Reshuffles are hardly a rarity in politics. Sometimes there’s a really good reason for them, other times they baffle everyone observing the events. Hillingdon Liberal Democrats have just carried out a reshuffle this month, and in the interest of openness, here’s what has happened and why. Blaise Bows Out Those of you who follow my blog or my Twitter know that I was heavily involved in Blaise Baquiche’s campaign in Uxbridge and South Ruislip earlier this year. Everyone involved had great fun, but it didn’t get the result we were looking for, unfortunately. That said, I and others assumed that we would continue to work with Blaise into the General Election, but circumstances had other ideas. Blaise had to move recently, partly as a result of his father dying during the pandemic, and therefore found himself living in Chelsea and Fulham. At the same time, Chelsea and Fulham found themselves needing a parliamentary candidate. As such, this was a serendipitous match made in heaven, and Blaise reluctantly stood down as candidate for Uxbridge & South Ruislip. Jonathan Joins In In the wake of Blaise’s departure, the head of our local party, Jonathan Banks, elected to step up. Jonathan previously campaigned as parliamentary candidate for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner, and he indicated that he would happily resume this role for the good of the party and the constituents. Jonathan asked me what we ought to do about this, given I was currently the candidate for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner. Rexy Relocates As I had already been doing a lot of campaigning in Uxbridge with Blaise and as I felt that Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner would be left in very capable hands, I was more than happy to move my candidacy to Uxbridge and South Ruislip. I still get to be “Rexy For Ruislip”, the constituency is a little closer to home, and I am very happy that Jonathan is stepping into the role that I am vacating. I have very much enjoyed getting to know Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner during my candidacy, and I look forward to the opportunity to get to know Uxbridge and South Ruislip just as well. Final Thoughts Many thanks to Blaise for all his hard work – he will be missed. And thank you to Jonathan for stepping in to the candidate role again. Hopefully this is the start of a really solid period of development for Hillingdon.