Multimodal Essay
Election debates are usually fiery affairs of clashing ideologies and verbal fisticuffs. Not this one. On a day when the Conservative candidate failed to turn up, Labour, Liberal Democrats and the Green Party shook hands and struggled to disagree. At the Your Future event hosted by the Students' Union at Bournemouth University last week, the candidates said the expected things, took the expected swipes at the Tories, and sang a sweet harmony — much like the Barden Bellas in pre-Beca days.
Photographs & text: Gokul Aanandh Bhoopathy and Thanh Hung Nguyen
Audio and additional reporting: Syed Naqi Akhter and Maria Moita Amaral, with Nichola Hunter-Warburten, Uyen Ngo, Jennifer Chibuobasi, Gift Osamwoyni, and Megan Turner
The event had not one but two chairs: SUBU President Chike Dike and Professor Einar Thorsen, Executive Dean of the Faculty of Media and Communication. If this was an indication that the organisers expected a heated debate, they were in for a disappointment.
Prof Einar Thorsen looks up to SUBU President Chike Dike during a pre-event tête-à-tête
Prof Einar Thorsen looks up to SUBU President Chike Dike during a pre-event tête-à-tête
The first candidates to arrive were Jessica Toale (Labour, Bournemouth West) and Tom Hayes (Labour, Bournemouth East). Jon Nicholas (Liberal Democrat, Bournemouth East), Darren Jones (Green Party, Bournemouth West), and Jeff Hanna (Lib Dem, Bournemouth West) arrived soon after.
Darren Jones, hand on head, contemplates life. Or the debate. Or the Green Party's future. We didn't get to ask
Darren Jones, hand on head, contemplates life. Or the debate. Or the Green Party's future. We didn't get to ask
Jon Nicholas (left) and Darren Jones shake hands while Jessica Toale, well, lets them.
Jon Nicholas (left) and Darren Jones shake hands while Jessica Toale, well, lets them.
Candidates (left to right) Jon Nicholas, Jessica Toale, Darren Jones and Jeff Hanna take a front seat at their own event
Candidates (left to right) Jon Nicholas, Jessica Toale, Darren Jones and Jeff Hanna take a front seat at their own event
When the debate began, Conservative MP Tobias Ellwood, whose seat Hayes is contesting, was missing from, well, his seat.
As the debate got underway, Prof Thorsen provided this, um, insightful explanation for why Tory MP Ellwood or any other representative could not make the event.
In her two-minute introduction, Jessica Toale (Labour, Bournemouth West) said she really loves Bournemouth and has a lot of family in the area. She didn't quite mention that she is a Westminster City councillor. Instead she said she wanted to unlock "the amazing creative potential" of Bournemouth. She ended her pitch on a smooth feminist note (and a dig at the missing Conservatives).
Tom Hayes (Labour, Bournemouth East) too made a polished, politically correct pitch (and the expected dig at the Conservatives). He spoke of voter disillusionment and the need for change and the need for solutions. He said he and Toale were at the event to listen to the "amazing ideas, amazing solutions" they knew were in this room so that they could take it all back and feed it into the Labour manifesto.
Jeff Hanna (Liberal Democrat, Bournemouth West), spoke of his past and why and how he joined the Lib Dems -- and ran out of time.
Jon Nicholas (Liberal Democrat, Bournemouth East) began his allocated two minutes trying to connect with his audience by speaking of the days he flipped burgers, mixed cement, and fried fish in Bournemouth -- and ran out of time.
Darren Jones (Green Party, Bournemouth West), predictably, spoke of the environment and sustainability. He did not run out of time.
Jessica Toale responds to a question while Jeff Hanna loses himself in thought. Co-chair Dike presented the sobering fact 97 per cent of the students were worried about rising living costs, "with many reporting extreme emotional distress, anxiety and helplessness". All candidates agreed that this was terrible and had happened because of the Conservatives.
A view of the audience, predominantly students. Dike said many students had just "£4 a week for other living essentials" once they had paid rent. The candidates agreed that this too was a bad situation brought about by the Conservatives.
If the Labour candidates were measured in their response, (and the Conservatives absent), Jon Nicholas of the Lib Dem was passionate. He spoke about "the absolutism" (?) that has got the nation into a mess where people were being pushed towards food banks and afraid of losing shelter. This just is not good for a "first world country". Uh-oh. Not quite the right language (he was to return to 'firstworldness' again later), but we appreciate the sentiment.
The unwelcome environment that international students face, despite paying higher fees, came up for discussion. Jeff Hanna said he wanted international students to stay. Jessica Toale said UK should be as welcoming as possible. Tom Hayes said education should be funded better to make this happen. Darren Jones agreed, calling for international students to be charged at "a realistic rate". Jon Nicholas agreed, calling for "fairness and equality at every level".
Once the chairs opened up the debate to audience questions, the conflict in Gaza came up. This was not surprising, given the fresh vote in Parliament. In fact, anti-war protestors had gathered outside the debate venue earlier in the evening, calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
Where did the candidate stand on ceasefire? Everyone wanted the killings to end.
But.
There was a big political 'but' for the Labour, who had shied away from calling for an immediate ceasefire.
"We all want the fighting to stop," said Jessica Toale. "But how do you get to that point? You can’t just call for a ceasefire, you have to say what steps are we going to take.”
Jon Nicholas, for his part, said he was completely in favour of a ceasefire. But he didn't agree with the blanket disapproval of Israel and the blanket dismissal of all those on Palestinian and Gaza sides.
Jeff Hanna said he hoped the government would call for an immediate ceasefire. But, he said, "Hamas committed atrocities that we must remember."
Darren Jones had no major 'buts'. “It is clearly a terrible situation, a situation that no one should have to go through,” he said.
“The only way out of this is dialogue. Hopefully, we will move to a position where all the posturing ceases and they do get adults around the table.”
Read more on the protest: 'The bombs simply must stop'
More questions, more harmony. Everyone said they would listen to voters and build consensus. At which point, the co-chair, perhaps conscious this had all gone on for too long, set the candidates off on closing statements with this question: why should students vote for you?
Jon Nicholas said he was "very, very local" and called ‘’consensus-oriented, Green-and-labour coalition’’. Jessica Toale agreed, saying students should vote for her because she would bring together people to "help Bournemouth reach its potential". Darren Jones said there was a "need to reach across everybody regardless of their political orientation". Jeff Hanna said if Toale won against him in Bournemouth West, that was all right. He would still be celebrating because there would be "one less Conservative MP". Once again, everyone was in agreement.
Jessica Toale talks to students after the debate. Photo: Gokul Aanandh Bhoopathy
Jessica Toale talks to students after the debate. Photo: Gokul Aanandh Bhoopathy
As the venue began to empty and the candidates worked the crowd one final time, our colleague Nichola Hunter-Warburton spoke to SUBU President Chike Dike. How did he think the debate went? He was pleased with the turnout. And relieved that there were no fireworks. He said: "The candidates were lovely to each other."
We agree.
About this story
This was meant to be a different kind of story. Our professor had assigned us the theme 'Expressions of politics' for a photo essay, and had asked us to capture the facial responses of candidates when other contestants were speaking.
This sounded great. But we soon found out that it wasn't easy. We lacked the speed. The lighting wasn't great. We also did not have the lens power to get those kind of shots. So we had to rethink. We were only three weeks into our course, and we had not covered politics before.
But after some research, and taking inspiration from photoessays from the Guardian, we came up with the idea of 'harmony'. We had noticed how much the candidates agreed with each other, sometimes a bit shamefacedly (listen to them). Watching other videos of UK political debates helped.
Talking it through with our professor, we decided to take a satirical approach to this essay. The rest of our team was working on text stories and had recorded the whole debate. Taking reference from some of the multimedia stories we had seen, we decided to use audio clips and turn our photoessay into this multimodal essay. It took us a week of work, in between classes, on evenings, and into the nights to put all the elements of this story together.
Thanh Hung Nguyen & Gokul Aanandh Bhoopathy
with
Nichola Hunter-Warburten
Syed Naqi Akhter
Maria Moita Amaral
Jennifer Chibuobasi
Uyen Ngo
Gift Osamwoyni
Megan Turner
Editorial mentors: Chindu Sreedharan & Jason Hallet
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