Deptford Independents
More than 21,000 candidates will stand in the 2022 local elections, and 1,577 of those will be standing as Independents – without the backing of a major party, and often campaigning alone. I went out on the campaign trail with the Independents running in Deptford, where I live, on the final weekend before election day.
"It’s about putting some compassion and some community back into Town Hall. It has become about statistics and percentages, and saving money," Ray Barron-Woolford, who is standing as an Independent in neighbouring Brockley ward, told me. Ray runs Kath's Place, a food bank and charity shop in Deptford, which decided to put forward its own candidates for election to the council. Jasmine Fulcher, a Junior Doctor, is one of them. “We’ve all been in positions of poverty, so we all understand what it’s like to be literally counting the pennies and to have to make really serious choices. … I think the reality is that a lot of people who are in politics have never been in that position,” she said. “I grew up in this area, I went to Deptford Green School. ... It’s trying to get people to see that there is an alternative, and that it’s a very real alternative to vote for an Independent councillor.”
Nik Baksi is also running, but on his own ticket. “It really incensed me when I wrote [to] my local ward councillors and never received a reply,” he told me when I asked what had inspired him to run. “Perhaps it’s the North American in me, but if you’re a person representing constituents you should always write your constituents back.”
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