Quick hustings underway at the Goldenhill community centre - from left we’ve got Tory Jonathan Gullis, Ind Matt Dilworth, two chairpeople, Labour’s Ruth Smeeth, Green Alan Borgars and BXP Rich Watkin all Stoke-on-Trent North candidates #GeneralElection19

Sorry I missed Lib Dem Peter Andras before the two chairpeople - he’s gone first and it’s not gone down great - few murmurs for his pitch for stopping Brexit

Alan Borgars is up now, the Green Party chap wants more green jobs for the potteries - he slams first buses as a “problem” - “only the Green Party can deliver the new hope and prosperity Stoke-on-Trent north needs”. He has got a big round of applause from the audience

Slightly bigger than Mr Gullis’s opening applause - “teacher, trade unionist and Tory - three things you thought you’d never see” he opens with

He’s said the word “delay” a lot - someone has shouted “it’s your government mate!”

“I’ve slipped it in four times now,” finished Mr Gullis - he’s talking about the party’s motto not anything else

Ruth Smeeth has started her speech to some whooping and applause - she jokes “you’re not here to listen to the Conservative party candidate for Islington”. She says she is stilling standing as labour mp “because I care” ... “I care about the fact we have lost 571 police officers”

People in the audience blaming labour for austerity when Ruth talks on schools funding being cut - a few clapped this

“I want more than 2,000 jobs coming to our city, because actually they’re not new jobs” finishes Ruth

Independent Matt Dilworth - a former labour supporter who is a staunch leaver is up now - he’s got a little applause after introducing himself as Billy no mates

Here’s a picture for @CapnSwiss for his archive/political YouTube channel

He’s had a couple claps for supporting Brexit - he’s now talking on his policy about recalling politicians who defect to other parties - a few claps for this

Richard watkin for the Brexit party up now - he’s got a few cheers and some applause - his opening gambit is that the tories have voted against Brexit and brokered a bad deal

“Please think long and hard, do you really want to leave Europe or do you want to be one foot in and one foot out” says rich. Before adding “do we want to become a free nation again” - lady next to me says “he’s no Nigel farage is he?”

Oh yeah and this is the lady next to me - not even joking https://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/stoke-on-trent-news/i-agree-how-race-hate-2615248

Mr Gullis up again now says he wants to create “silicon Stoke”. Big applause for him

@MD4MP wants more funding from central gov if he was elected he would lobby for it

Mr Andras had a crack at it but failed to inspire much applause - he is a Lib Dem in front of possibly the toughest crowd going tbf

Ruth Smeeth says she’s been lobbying government for ceramics R&D centre - “everything we have now is made out of ceramics” ... “what we don’t need is more logistics jobs” - big applause

Ruth’s point was that ceramics is used in mobile phones, even body armour now - Dorinda Bailey has asked me “what’s the point in having a good education if you end up on the pots?” Not sure she heard the bit about research and development etc

Mr Borgars said something about thatcher ripping the heart of the Stoke-on-Trent - got some claps

Brexit watkin wants more local investment - blames labour for the city being poor still

@MD4MP is courting the room well after a question on local transport infrastructure

“Traffic in the city is a complete killer” says Ruth Smeeth - a solution could be to ask gov to open M6 toll for free when accidents happen - she also slams the public transport locally

Alan Borgars says the gridlock in Stoke-on-Trent is “the worst I’ve ever seen” and touts an affordable sustainable public transport system linking from keele uni to Leek - he also says SoT has 9th worst pollution lvls of any city

Mr watkin wants investment up here not down south “the only way we’re gonna get it is by getting out of Europe”.

Mr Gullis says the council is gonna sort the buses and wants to bid for 28bn fund for better roads

“Get rid of the potholes,” shouts one voice from the back of the room

Views on law and order now... Mr Andras says it’s quite obvious - less cops - more crime. He says the Lib Dem’s budget will invest in cops

Ruth Smeeth up now, hammers the 571 loss of cops and closure of police stations like Burslem “if you want to see a police officer you have to go Longton”

Ruth adds that people being charged aren’t getting into the system for 12 months due to “decimated” CPS

Mr Borgars says the justice system is broken and that prison sentences are too lenient

Mr watkin says we need more police and more prisons “I do not think the answer when a prison is full is to let them out”.

Mr Gullis says the Conservative party are making a strong stance with 20k cops - he also says they’ve funded 10k more prison places “when they are in prison for serious offences, life means life”.

He adds that labour promise just 10k cops - Ruth saying that’s not true

@MD4MP says it’s clear we need more police “it’s a good thing to hear they wanna top it back up to where it was before” jokes Matt

He would support any proposal for more cops regardless of which government gets in this December

Lots of whispers in the audience saying @MD4MP “comes across really well”.

A man has kicked off that these don’t sound like the people of Stoke-on-Trent wrote these questions “I put my name on!” Others shouting “stitch up”

A Green Party chap - Jan is his first name - has stood up and said it’s not a stitch up as one of his questions has been read out

Shortly before that uproar I believe it was a question on jobs - again Ruth makes the case for modern ceramics jobs being done her bcoz of who we are here - she’s amazed by what’s being done in defence with ceramics - slams Tory gov for blocking industrial strategy

Mr watkin says he’s spent most of his life in biz and has run bizs - “what we need to do is travel to get businesses here” as land is cheap and good transport links and geographical position

Mr Gullis says we need to skill our children with a world class education - we need gigabit broad - he mentions silicon stoke again and slashing biz rates

Matt Dilworth says he doesn’t have a background in biz but he’s “seen the area” ... “buildings derelict for god knows how many years, it doesn’t give off the right impression”. He supports slashing biz rates and raising the minimum wage but not quite to £10

Not quite to £10 next year “but far before 2023” he said

Lib Dem Andras is a professor of computer science - he agrees people need up skilling regularly

Next question is on how to move forward with Brexit - Borgars up first he says he wants a people’s vote - massive boos “been there done that”

It’s with mentioning illegal spending scandals and Cambridge analytica says Alan Borgars - shouty man at back is not happy

Chairman Tom Simpson has stopped the meeting to give shouty man a telling off essentially - “you’ve got to let them have their say”

Mr watkin says “quite simply we voted to leave the European Union” ... he wd leave at the end of the month, with a free trade deal. And adds something about french farmers blocking roads and German farmers shaking in boots because “we sell more to them than them to us”

Mr Gullis promises to leave and have great trade deals with other countries

Mr Dilworth is a leave voter, is not in favour of the people’s vote. He would vote against a second ref unless there was a choice of 2 leave options

Mr Andras says the best for the country is to stay in the EU - Dorinda says “I don’t know how you dare stand in this constituency.” She’s got a point he is brave

Ruth up now who says she voted for the referendum, to revoke Article 50, resigned the front bench and is one of 19 labour MPs to vote for the deal - she shows a letter she got from Boris thanking her for that

Labour and Tory activists fighting - Ruth says “you don’t even live in this constituency”. Several in the audience sounding angry - someone has shouted something about antisemitism an someone has responded “You Twat”

Chairman has had to call for order again

Summing up now - Mr Borgars says the Green Party will invest in green jobs locally and reform education and justice

Mr watkin says going forward labour will bankrupt the country and give u two remain votes, the tories will tie us into negotiations for years to come bcoz the EU want our money n fish

Mr Andras LD up now, he says staying in the EU is only way to have cash to invest in cops and nhs

Mr Dilworth says democracy is about choice and this constituency isn’t short on options - he says you vote for him because you want to and you think he’s trustworthy. He wants more public services funding, Brexit and a new voting system - also will donate half salary to charity

Ruth says she won’t be bullied and says if u wanna talk about that talk to me about it - she is reading out statistics about why you should vote labour: a&e waiting times soaring locally, police officer and station cuts, schools funding lost, overcrowded classes

“We simply cannot afford another five years” of the Conservatives

Mr Gullis says this is a two horse race between labour and Tory - he goes back to Brexit saying labour is remain heavy

Very happy to report that is over.

Mr Gullis has come over to apologise he had his figures wrong about cops and Ruth was right