St Austell says no to Caroline Righton's Conservatives

Congratulations to John Oxenham, sorry, Councillor John Oxenham, Steve Gilbert, Hamish and the hardworking team in St Austell & Newquay who have tonight taken this seat of St Austell Bay from the Conservatives with a 13% swing.

This result is on the back of a by-election victory in Newquay South just two weeks ago when Lib Dem Councillor Sandy Carter was victorious over the Conservatives.

This really is a slap on the back for the team there, especially the Liberal Democrats Westminster PPC, Steve Gilbert and a slap in the face for the Conservative candidate Caroline Righton who many of you may recall has yet to apologise for the smear campaign against Steve Gilbert.
















This election result proves that the old style Conservative smear and sleaze politics is yet again rejected, just because David Cameron says they've changed doesn't mean they have and as recent events in Cornwall by Caroline Righton have shown, it proves the Conservatives have not changed their deep down core, just the spin and gloss on top.

Thankfully as John Oxenham has shown tonight, people are starting to see straight through it.

Caroline Righton - the silence is broken

Finally, Steve Gilbert and the Cornwall Liberal Democrats hear from Caroline Righton, after she finally breaks her silence, the Conservative candidate caught up in the middle of a Twitter/email smear campaign against Steve Gilbert.

Well, not entirely. As reported over on Matt Davies blog (do you know how much it hurts to link to a Spurs fan?) Caroline Righton has finally broken her silence, now the local Lib Dems have written to David Cameron, but only to a journalist over at This is Cornwall.

Steve Gilbert's response to the journalist was; Mr Gilbert said: "I would like to think this was a careless mistake rather than a deliberate smear, but it's sad that the Conservatives don't have the courtesy to set the record straight with local residents, or the manners to apologise."

However, Steve being a mild mannered and polite politician I think is being way too soft.

Caroline Righton not only has failed to apologise, to Steve Gilbert but also the people of St Austell & Newquay, she has also showed a real lack of judgement on this.

It means Caroline Righton does not understand Twitter nor the concept of running a positive and honest campaign as she had pledged to do.

The minor point is that Caroline Righton was in fact not in a meeting with the Crown Prosecutor etc, Caroline was in fact in the audience of the event to be fair, as I said, minor but if Caroline is wanting to run a positive and honest campaign then she needs to be honest!

I do feel Caroline Righton has to;

1. Apologise to Steve Gilbert for this personal smear on his good name
2. Apologise to the people of St. Austell & Newquay
3. Learn how to use Twitter properly
4. Learn to check emails and facts
5. Say the word sorry

If you are new to this story, check this Caroline Righton reader out at Lib Dem Voice to catch up on what different bloggers have been saying about this story from the very beginning.

The Caroline Righton smear campaign moves onto Wikipedia

On Sunday both myself and Councillor Matt Davies blogged about Caroline Righton's smear campaign of the Lib Dems candidate for St. Austell & Newquay, Steve Gilbert.

Then yesterday there was a series of postings across a range of blogs about how one week on neither Caroline Righton or the local Conservatives had had the decency to apologise and advise the same voters of the mistake as the week before, so the local Liberal Democrats have now written a letter to David Cameron and Eric Pickles seeking an answer.

When you visit Caroline Righton's page on Wikipedia it appears that all is not well there either.

It appears a member of Caroline Righton's staff has blanked the page at least twice and seems very determined to take it down, much to the annoyance of Wikipedia. Here is the conversation from the discussion page on Caroline Righton's wikipedia page between a member of her staff and Wikipedia staff.

Caroline Righton Does not want to have a Wikipedia Page —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cabkol (talk • contribs) 00:24, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

It's not up to her. Wikipedia has strong policies about the content of biographies of living persons, so please do feel free to correct any factual inaccuracies or any lack of neutrality of its presentation. But blanking the article is not an option. She is a notable person. --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 00:36, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

How can it not be up to her? surely she can choose what on here? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cabkol (talk • contribs) 00:48, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

She has more control about what appears on here than she does over the news, but she does not control whether or not information appears at all. She is a notable public figure. She does, however, have control over the accuracy of the information presented, if anything in the article is inaccurate. I mention the news comparison in my first sentence to make my basic point -- no, she cannot choose whether or not she has an article on here, just as she cannot choose whether or not the news, or any other public source, releases information on her. Ginsengbomb (talk) 00:52, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Are you the Anon editor who blanked the page on 1st October? As users Escape Orbit and Ginsengbomb have pointed out, she passes the criteria for WP:notability. However, be aware that: (1) continually blanking the page will get you banned, (2) As you claim to work for Caroline Righton, you may be blocked from editing this page through rules on WP:BIAS. As has been pointed out, you or Caroline Righton can point out issues of inaccuracy which can be quickly modified. I would also advise, having been involved with other pages where users where concerned about content inclusion or editing by those with an agenda, that there are other rules and outlined ways of dealing with concerns of those who have articles at Wikipedia. If you could communicate here or to one of us on our talk pages what these concerns are, perhaps we could address these directly. Not having a page is not an option, but making sure it is accurate and managing it carefully are all covered within our rules. If you have any questions, happy to chat. Rgds, --Trident13 (talk) 10:02, 11 October 2009 (UTC).

Caroline Righton and her dirty tricks smear campaigns

I blogged about this on Sunday, you can read that here, but now a week later Caroline Righton and the Conservatives still have not apologised to Lib Dem PPC for St. Austell & Newquay, Steve Gilbert for circulating emails with made up content.

It is difficult to accept that someone who has worked in the media in the past didn't think to check whether the original Twitter message by Steve Gilbert did in fact contain the word D***h**d.

I find it unacceptable that neither Caroline Righton nor the Conservatives have in fact apologised to Steve Gilbert and the good people of St. Austell & Newquay for her smear and mistake.

Let us see how David Cameron responds to this letter, and see if he backs Caroline Righton's smear campaign?

You can read more about this over at Norfolk Blogger, Mark Pack's blog, Christopher Lovell's blog and Jeremy Rowe's blog.

Caroline Righton and Tories in dirty campaign tricks - shame

As a former campaign organiser for the Liberal Democrats in London I worked with some amazing Councillors who really worked hard trying to do their bit to improve their wards, Stephen Gilbert was one of those who I only got to work with for a short while, but he has turned into one of my best friends within the party.

The one thing that always struck me with Steve was his love for his Cornwall, and when the opportunity came to stand to e the next MP for St. Austell & Newquay he jumped for it and I am so pleased that he is the Liberal Democrats candidate and another of my best friends is the constituency organiser down there - a winning team!

Obviously Steve is rattling the Conservatives down there to the extent that they are running a dirty tricks campaign which is utterly disgraceful.

Caroline Righton (the Conservative candidate) has misrepresented Steve, either deliberately or by mistake in an email she has apparently sent to local residents and also appears to have told a story which not only isn't true, but can very simply be checked! Perhaps she should have done that before sending her email out?

Last Wednesday, both Steve and the Conservative candidate had been invited to two different events - one a question time sort of radio debate, to be broadcast live on Radio Devon, the other a last-minute invite to a meeting about the regeneration of St.Columb, a key town in the constituency of St. Austell & Newquay.

Steve had been down to ask a question to the panel at the radio debate but took the view that the local regeneration issue was more important thn the radio interview - so withdrew from that to go to the St.Columb meeting. The Conservative candidate took the opposite view, and therefore sent her apologies to the local regeneration forum.

Now, sat up here in my flat in Edinburgh it is not for me to decide for one of our top candidates what he should or shouldn't do, but if Steve was one of my candidates, I wold be telling him he did the right thing.

Like lots of candidates across the UK, Steve uses Facebook and Twitter to keep constituents, friends and supporters updated on what he's doing as well as his website.

After that night's meeting he Twittered: "was at meeting about regeneration of major town (declined by Tory PPC; Tory PPC at a publicity stunt (declined by me)"

Bizarrely I actually remember the tweet, as I was on my way home and catching up on Twitter via my Blackberry on UberTwitter.

So, imagine my surprise to find that the Conservative candidate, Caroline Righton then shared this on her email but alleging that Steve had actually sent this out with this next piece added in "D***h**d!!!"

She then goes onto say "I was sent the comment below by a constituent who is privy to my opposition's Twitter emissions, which I am not. Apparently his asterisk'd comment is highly abusive."

Now, the above comment does also add another dimension, because on inspection of Caroline's Twitter account shows that she does in fact follow Steve Gilbert so would have been aware of his tweet - they aren't called emissions! Or, she doesn't actually use her account properly in which case Twitter should suspend it.

However, Caroline's last tweet was from the day after the Radio Debate, so I checked Steve's Twitter account also, to be fair and balanced and to confirm my memory and here is the entry "was at meeting about regeneration of major town (declined by Tory PPC); Tory PPC at a publicity stunt (declined by me)....10:15 PM Oct 21st from web"

As you can see, no mention of D***H**d - it is things like this that ruin politics and I hope Caroline Righton will now formally apologise to Steve and email those same people she did last week to say sorry - if I was Steve I would look to take further action because the Conservatives should not allow candidates like this to represent them or is it that the Conservatives haven't actually changed?

This kind of behaviour should not be tolerated by the people of St. Austell & Newquay nor the Conservative Party and I hope they will show the Conservatives candidate that she is in fact not Right-on at all and this action will not be tolerated. If this was in a job, she would actually be fired, let us see if David Cameron acts on this underhanded campaign tactic?

You can read this story as written by another friend, Councillor Matt Davies.