YF Marathon

On 18 and 19 April we turned up in large numbers in four London target seats to support four brilliant Labour candidates across the capital. Over the weekend we supported Catherine West, Neil Coyle, Ruth Cadbury and Dawn Butler.

Essex and the North West

The London Marathon followed a number of other campaign days as we work hard to secure a Labour victory. In February we headed to Harlow in Essex to support the excellent Suzy Stride to support her bid to unseat Robert Halfon.

In March we headed to the North West to campaign with four great key Labour candidates. On the Saturday we supported Nick Bent in Warrington South, Julia Tickridge in Weaver Vale and finished off with Chris Matheson in City of Chester and were delighted to be joined by Teresa Griffin MEP.

The following day we were were joined by Labour Students and Co-operative Youth to back Jeff Smith in Manchester Withington.

#KickNickOut

But perhaps the biggest of the lot was the bid to kick Nick Clegg out of Sheffield Hallam. On 7 March Young Fabians joined forces with Labour Students and local activists to support Oliver Coppard’s campaign drive and, with Lord Ashcroft’s latest polls showing Labour ahead in Clegg’s constituency, #KickNickOut could yet prove to be one of the defining moments of the 2015 election.

This significant level of youth support reflected Clegg’s infamous broken promise on tuition fees and his support for a Conservative-led coalition that scraped EMA and introduced the bedroom tax. It also reflects Coppard’s dedicated work on behalf of local young people, including his petition for local estate agents to scrap letting fees.

Oliver Coppard, Labour candidate for Sheffield Hallam, was in confident mood. Ahead of the campaigning day he said:

"I'm really pleased that the Young Fabians are coming up to Sheffield to support us, and that we're getting such significant support from young people from across the country. Young people and students have been let down more than perhaps any other group by this government. It's not only the scrapping of EMA, the spiralling cost of housing or the huge number of young people who are unemployed, it's the wider sense that this government is ignoring the needs of young people.

“Nick Clegg's decision to treble fees has been fundamental to the loss of faith in politicians of all stripes. That's why I'm putting young people at the heart of our campaign and why I'm so committed to working on behalf of the 12,000 students who live in Hallam if I'm elected in May."