Two hour before the polls open and I am sitting in my flat in the City of London waiting to vote. My eye is caught by an article in the FT – “How the Conservatives lost hold of the South” and I click through

From the gleaming financial towers of Bishopsgate to the discreet town houses of Mayfair, the parliamentary constituency that goes by the name of Cities of London and Westminster houses some of the world’s wealthiest corporations.

The residents, some of whom live in the capital’s most coveted real estate, include a number of the richest people in the world. And on July 4, if the opinion polls are correct, they will do something they have never done before: vote Labour.

I am a resident (though not one of the richest people in the world). At a time when Theresa May was in charge of the Conservative Party , I thought it could bring a kind of compassionate conservatism and represented the constituency at the Tory party conference.

But I will not be voting Conservative today.

Gosh this is brutal 🔥

pic.twitter.com/5CZP0eDk91

— Savan Qadir (@savanQadir) July 2, 2024

My vote will go to Liberal Ed Lucas, a journalist on the Economist and someone I know professionally, but more importantly, a member of a party that could do rather better as the party of opposition than the corrupt, entitled and woefully out of touch Conservative party.

Polling day is today!

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow

It is very likely that this constituency will, for the first time, elect a Labour party candidate and my vote may be considered “wasted”. But I have  sympathy for Frances Coppola’s point of view, expressed in her excellent blog published this morning.

..although I rejoice at the crushing of the corrupt and self-seeking Tories, I am aghast that we are about to elect a Labour government that seems to have nothing better to offer than more of the same. Where is the investment that our economy so desperately needs? Where are the repairs to our social safety net? Where, oh where, is the commitment to putting care for people and the environment at the heart of our politics and our society?

Labour have made all the right noises this election but in a minor key. They have put such distance between them and the campaign of 2019, that they will win by a mile.

But it has meant that instead of choosing a party to Govern us based on a vision of social justice, we have but a vague and disturbing slogan of “change”.

This time, there is no vision. Labour’s mantra of “change” seems to mean little more than “not the Tories”. And that seems to be all the voters want. People aren’t voting for anything. They are voting against the Tories.

In a week where there is a very real chance of the far-right winning a majority in France, the centre ground is asserting itself in England on the shakiest of grounds. In terms of votes cast, the Reform party may well have come second in Britain , this time tomorrow.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, so starts the greatest statement of despair in the English language

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,

To the last syllable of recorded time;

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more. It is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.

This is the vision  that I am fighting to avoid this morning, the attractive proposition that nothing matters and that my vote matters least of all.

I know that there will be many who read this blog who share this feeling and will, instead of marching boldly to the polling station, entering the boot and marking their paper with one clear X , will do nothing.

But this is as narcissistic as Macbeth’s collapse into nihilism. We must- for all the disappointments of the failures of recent years, view tomorrow as an opportunity.

For today is tomorrow, today we start again.

VOTE