So last Monday in the Argus on the 1st August I wrote a column which was also my blog here on the same day. The title of my blog was “Call out our local needs to these two PM candidates” and the headline in the Argus was “Time Sussex got something from Wannabe PMs” and the main content was how to respond to the campaign that the Conservative Party is currently working on to determine who their next Prime Minister or perhaps just their leader will be. At the end of the piece I stated

Of course, the prospect of a non-Conservative Government will be seriously improved if the Labour party is willing to coordinate with other groups. Ideally, they will work with the Liberal Democrats and the Greens in constituencies that are currently marginally dominated by Conservatives which includes several locations here in Sussex. Let us hope they will start soon!

Now there is a very clear indication that several of the Sussex Constituents could easily shift away from the Conservative Party if the existing party groups and the residents who vote would be willing to be flexible. Indeed this analysis has taken place over many years. However it is always very encouraging when a public agency such as The New Statesman magazine publishes something that covers the same details. One of my friends, Colin Miller spotted this piece yesterday and along with the numbers they have set out they are proposing that here in Sussex which is currently 13 Conservative, 2 Labour (Hove and Brighton Kemptown) and 1 Green MP (Brighton Pavilion) that if there was an election very soon that Labour could be successful in Hastings and Rye, East Worthing and Shoreham, Crawley and the Liberal Democrat could achieve Lewes and Eastbourne. So this would change the situation to 8 Conservative, 5 Labour, 2 Liberal Democrat and 1 Green MP. This would place Sussex in having 50% Conservative and 50% of Parties that could work together.

Along with the Sussex improvement there is also a suggestion that the current Kent situation with the existing 17 constituencies of which 1 is Labour (Canterbury – Rosie Duffield) and 16 are Conservative, that there is a prospect of Dover and South Thanet both going to Conservative. Although 14 Conservative is still very significant in Kent, to have 3 Labour MPs would be very helpful.