How to vote Labour.

David is right, I felt an awful dirty feeling when I saw Labour's sanitised election poster defacing this blog. I am, of course, encouraging people to vote Labour to keep the Tories out, the Lib Dems are not offering that guarantee, so any argument that they are a progressive force has to be questioned. Plus I have it on good authority that Nick Clegg is in fact just a trick of the light.

Still, sadly in most constituencies in the country Labour is the least shit option. There is the odd place where a Labour vote doesn't hurt too much, for example, my own constituency of Islington North where the brilliant Jeremy Corbyn is the standing MP. Others are not so lucky. You can check up on the voting record of the local MP here

But there are exceptions TUSC are standing in a handful of places like Tottenham where Jenny Sutton is running a great campaigning against the Blairite incumbent, Higher Education Secretary David 'follows like a Lamb'  Lammy.

There is also Respect and in particular Salma Yaqoob in Birmingham. If she wins could be the one positive thing to come out of this election. A left wing campaigner and the first Muslim woman MP. 

Oh and let's not forget Dai Davies in Blaenau Gwent (he wouldn't be the first Muslim woman MP, but still worth a punt) and Caroline Lucas and Derek Wall for the Greens. Either would be the first Green MP and a welcome addition parliament

But that still leaves some 500 constituencies where there is no left candidate of any stripe standing. So, in these areas here's how to vote Labour: 

Think of the polling booth like the toilets at Glastonbury. Take a deep breath, pop a peg on your nose, run in a do the dirty deed. It's Brown, it's not nice, but it is necessary.