This morning Councillor Lindsay Frost, Cabinet Member for Health and Adult Social Care on Croydon Council and campaign manager for Gavin Barwell, the Conservative candidate for Croydon Central, passed away. Here, Gavin Barwell pays tribute to his friend and colleague.
I will remember Lindsay most as a tireless and committed campaigner. Back
in December 2007 when Andrew Pelling announced that he didn't wish to
stand for re-election, Lindsay and I - along with 100 other people -
applied for the vacancy. We both got through to the final four and I
narrowly pipped him at the post. Most people in that situation would
have said to themselves, "If they don't want me as their candidate,
they can find someone else to do all the leg-work" - but not Lindsay. He
devoted the last 25 months of his life to trying to get me elected. In
all that time, until his recent illness, he only missed one canvass
session.
At the moment, many people feel that politicians
are only in it for themselves - understandable in the case of MPs given
recent events. But there is a whole other side to politics - tens of
thousands of people who give their time for free without any prospect
of financial reward, stuffing envelopes, delivering leaflets, knocking
on doors. They do it because they care about the place they live and
our country and they have strong views about how it could be a better
place. Lindsay was a titan among such people. I sit here writing this
and think of the hundreds of hours he spent trying to get me elected
that he could have spent with his family or at work or listening to his
beloved Peter Gabriel and I feel both guilty and humbled.
I
have so many memories - the car that parked itself, the competition to
find poster sites and deliverers, the nicknames for members of the
team, above all the way in which every time he sought to make the
back-breaking work of pounding the streets fun.
In a few
days' time, the council election campaign will get underway and Gordon
Brown is expected to finally announce the General Election. No-one in
Croydon Conservatives is going to feel like going out campaigning,
however, because we have lost one of our best. But we will do it
because that is what he would want. The last serious conversation I had
with him was on Wednesday night and he was absolutely determined to get
well and to be there at the count on 6th May and see us win. For me,
this campaign has taken on a new significance.
I will miss
Lindsay's support, his advice and most of all his friendship. But my
loss is trivial next to that of his wife Kerri and his young children
Holly and Dominic, to whom he was absolutely devoted. I am posting this
because as they grow up I want them to have a record of what kind of
man their Dad was. I invite those of you who knew him to add your own
memories.
Rest in peace my dear friend.
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