Eddie Lopez Lives in Slough
After being in the the country's most marginal seat at the General Election, I'm now in the middle of this Parliament's first byelection, in Cheadle. I've having to stock up on garlic and crucifixes in case I get canvassed by Michael Howard. (Would be be repelled by a Euro note brandished as a holy symbol, I wonder?)
The Tories seem to be running their campaign on the fact that their candidate, the former MP who lost the last two general elections, actually lives in the constituency rather than half-a-mile outside it. It's easy to imagine there's nothing else they positive can say about him. I call this the "Eddie Lopez Lives in Slough" tactic. Eddie Lopez was the Labour candidate in Slough in the 80s, unreformed Old Labour at it's worst, who's only selling point was that he didn't live in Ascot. He never came close to winning. Local band Nine Steps to Ugly even took the piss by recording a song called "Eddie Lopez Lives in Slough". That became his political epitaph.
Posted by TimHall at July 02, 2005 03:56 PM | TrackBackJust searched for "Eddie Lopez live in Slough" and found this site
http://www.geocities.com/oldtroutwindsoruk/
The song was played at a venue also graced by Oasis, The Verve, Blur, The Pixes, Porcupine Tree and the mighty Polish October amongst others.
Posted by: chris on July 3, 2005 08:51 PMTim Hall
You've got it wrong.
Eddie Lopez actually came very close to winning Slough in 1992. He lost by 514 votes, but a rogue candidate called Alford who also termed himself The Labour Candidate stood (election law has changed now to prevent this sort of thing) and, because he was top of the ballot paper, took 699 votes. He celebrated on election night with the winning Tories.
"Eddie Lopez Lives in Slough" wasn't taking the piss. Eddie Lopez had been instrumental in the establishment of a recording studio under the Slough Labour Rooms. The song was a Thank You.
Posted by: Tim Smith on March 11, 2006 07:01 PM