I joined the Labour at sixteen out of firm political convictions. It gradually took over my life - what with party activity and eight years being a Lambeth councillor. I have met the majority of friends and, indeed, former boyfriends, via the Labour Party. Even my fiancé, whom I met in a pub, turns out to resigned from the Young Socialists over Vietnam.
When I first joined, part of the Left - where I firmly placed myself - were characterised by a lack of humour and a strict adherence to dogma. There was a specific way to dress. I embraced the jeans, DMs and long dangly earrings, but ruined it by wearing brightly coloured tops. In my final year at Uni I took to wearing skirts (with thick tights and DMs, I hasten to add). Andy, who was Chair of the Conservative Association, told me that I didn't look like a lefty. I suggested to him that he did. We agreed that sometimes your message can be more effective if you challenge the stereotype.
Make no mistake, I was a serious politician.
However, I am also a human being with a predilection for developing embarrassing teenage crushes.
Back in 92, I was staying with Auntie Moira, one of only two people in her ATS regiment to vote Tory in 1945. Tony Blair, then Shadow spoke on Employment (I think) was on the TV. She asked me whether I thought he was dishy. Yuck, I said. He's going to be Prime Minister, she said. Rubbish, I said, after Neil Kinnock, it will be Gordon Brown.
1995. I was my constituency party's delegate to Young Labour conference. The oldest one - I slipped into the age range by one day. It ran concurrently with Local Government Conference. On the Sunday lunchtime, we came together for a series of keynote addresses.
I was late into the hall, and joined the group of other late people standing at the back. When Tony Blair began his speech, I panicked, realising that by standing, I would by default, have to join in the standing ovation. I spotted a spare seat next to Jimbo, then leader of Lambeth Labour Group. Our relationship over the years has been variable. But it was a seat. Stood just behind where I had been standing was Cherie, literally trembling with nerves as Tony spoke.
A few months later I had to substitute for Kate Hoey at an event. The main speaker was Paul Boateng.
When I met him, it was one of those very few occasions that I felt a tingle, an excitement, a lust-at-first-sight. He was very charming. (Of course, that's part of a politician's job description, but I've met a good few in my time, and he was different). I invited him down the Town Hall bar afterwards. He declined, much to my disappointment.
Nevertheless, I developed a crush on him, and still have it slightly.
I will never ever forget 1 May 1997 for as long as I have my marbles. Bliss it was in that dawn etc. Hope filled the country, a country disillusioned by Tory misrule. Even Auntie Moira voted Labour, and for the first time ever, Hove returned a Labour MP.
I was excited that finally we had a government whose policies were broadly on the right track, whose values were my values, and were staffed by people a little bit more like everyday people. I rapidly developed a mega celebrity crush on Tony Blair, that lasted for about three years. I know more about him than is healthy for anyone to know.
And although I am going through a period of disillusionment with politics, and with the Labour Party, I am still of the belief that it is a Good Thing to have a Labour Government.
If the Tories had won the 1997 election I cannot imagine the extent to which they would have destroyed public services. The Labour Government is totally committed to the NHS - spending is constrained, not by ideology, but by the skills shortage caused by the Tories. That more medical and allied staff are being trained is good - it just takes time.
The massive increases in education spending have been soured by the monumental cock-up in the current year's grant allocation. But, having been a school governor from 93-97 and a schools auditor from 2000 - 01, I can verify the results.
Foreign policy has been mixed, and transport policy woeful.
Where a Labour Government must make a difference, and has made a difference, is in Welfare-to-Work, civil rights and regeneration. Arguably, not enough of a difference - if you go from very poor to poor, you're still not rich. If you have a gay age of consent of 16, and the prospect of registered partnerships, it still doesn't create equality. A more rational approach to cannabis use and drugs education doesn't remove the poison of smack and crack from within our society.
Constitutional reforms have been bold with one hand and timid with the other.
I am still a die hard Labourite. But I don't fancy Tony Blair anymore.
And I won't tell you about the evening I spent in the pub persuading my MP that a Labour Government was a Good Thing!
