2 days and then 95 days?

Hi everyone, and welcome to the recent pledgers. 

I am incredibly grateful for your generosity, and really pleased to have exceeded our target of £7500. This is now the 2nd biggest Green Party crowd fund ever, only a few thousand pounds behind Caroline Lucas' one for Brighton. To be honest, I fine with that. ;-)

In the last few weeks we have been incredibly busy coping with the huge numbers of new members joining the Green Party. At one stage the national team were receiving dozens of applications per minute. There were 16,000 new members in a 2 week period, and earlier this week, the total went through 50,000. To put this in perspective, the target by the time of the election had been 25,000! 

More locally, I have attended my first hustings at Bristol Cathedral Choir School. It was my first experience of dealing with a UKIP representative. I have to say it was a jaw dropping moment but many of the things he said were so outrageous they needed no rebuttal. The audience show of hands at the end confirmed it; UKIP received no votes and I am pleased to say I received over 80% of the rest. It was a young audience of around 250 sixth form students, but around half will be old enough to vote and were registered to do so. If they are in any way representative of how young people are feeling, then it gives me great hope for the future. 

I am also pleased that my new website is due to go live very soon. We are currently writing the local content, based upon the draft manifesto, and will adding to it in the coming weeks. In particular, we will be adding the short videos that your pledges will have enabled us to create, along with copies of the leaflets and write up of the events that your funds have supported. 

The crowd fund closes in 2 days time, leaving us 95 days to make sure we win.  It is am amazing time to be in politics, and I am incredibly privileged to be able to represent you. 

Thanks again for your support, and I look forward to keeping in touch. 

Best wishes,

Darren