Hi all! My name's Sunil Prasannan, and I my only claim to fame (so far) is that I went to school with a certain Alex Hilton! Anyway, this is my first political blog ever, so here goes. I think I became politically aware just in time for the 1987 General Election. I had turned 11 the previous year, had done my 11+ (though back then, merely saw it as a daunting exam rather than a political football), and by then I pretty much had an opinion of Margaret Thatcher's government. I do remember specific events from the early and mid '80s, like the Falklands, Brighton and Lebanon, but by 1987 I first took a real interest in politics and elections. I knew that I had socialist leanings and had no real sympathy with Maggie's "share-owning democracy" nor with her treatment of the miners. I also felt some affinity with Mikhail Gorbachev's "new" Soviet government, and remember being not too impressed with that rapid turnover, mostly due to ill-health, of Soviet leaders during the early 80s. I remember being not to impressed with US president Ronald Reagan either, and I felt that the time had come for the Cold War to end.

Anyway, when I was in my final year at primary school (Newbury Park, in Ilford North), during season '86/'87, our year were drafted into "prefect" duties, such as monitoring younger classes if a teacher had to pop out for a few hours, or maybe lead out the younger classes to school assembly. One other duty was watching the staircases leading from ground to upper floor , during break-times and lunch times. We had to make sure everyone kept to their left-hand side of the staircase to avoid any collisions. So every thirty seconds or so, we would call out from our watch-points, "Keep to the left!". And this leads me neatly onto the title of this entry, because during the run-up to the '87 election, when I was on staircase duty I called out, yes, you've guessed it, "Keep to the left - vote Labour!" For a few days I didn't get much feedback either way until Mr. Rowley, who I knew must have been a Labour man (youngish teacher with a beard and all!) walked up the stairs and told me, I think, can't remember his exact words, but must have been something on the lines of, "No party political broadcasts on the stairs, please!"

Anyway, thus endeth my first entry on LabourHome.org.

Sunil