General Election Hustings

Date Time Place

• Date: Monday June 17th 
• Time: 7:30-9:30pm
• Location: Cherry Hinton Baptist Church,  Fishers Lane, CB1 9HR
• Attendance: 21 on Zoom, 120 in the building. 

Speakers

• Conservative   Chris Carter-Chapman
• Green              Miranda Fyfe
• Independent    James Gordon (via Zoom)
• Labour             Luke Viner
• Lib Dem           Pippa Heylings

Reform (Harrison Edwards) did not reply to our invitation

Moderator

• Prabhu Guptara, a Cherry Hinton resident, has moderated discussions and debates for radio, TV, social media, universities and the public in relation to politics, economics, technology and philosophy over 50 years, in several countries.  He has an established reputation for being objective & fair-minded; his decision in all matters is final.
• The Moderator’s job is time-keeping and ensuring that the discussion moves along in a balanced way.

Format of the “Election Hustings”

Introduction from Nic Boyns (Pastor, Cherry Hinton BaptistChurch) and Prabhu Guptara (Moderator) 

The first part of the meeting focuses on each candidate in turn (different questions to different candidates) 
* 4 mins for an opening statement from the particular candidate, 
* 1.5 mins for the audience to ask 2 or 3 questions to the particular candidate 
* 2 mins for the particular candidate to respond to the questions 

The second part of the meeting focuses on questions to be asked to each candidate in turn (same questions to each candidate)
* 1.5 mins for the audience to ask 2 or 3 questions 
* 5x2 mins for each candidate in turn to answer the questions
the above is repeated a total of 5 times

The final part of the meeting focuses on each candidate in turn 
* 1 min for a closing statement from the particular candidate 

Random Order

Candidates will be seated in a Random order (there will be 5 cards numbered 12345 which candidates will select on arrival

The order of speaking in each section will be 12345, 25413, 41352, 35214, 54321, 25413, 41352

Questions

• When members of the audience ask questions, it would be helpful if they would please give their name and say whether they are have a political party allegiance
• Members of the audience, when invited to pose questions, should please do so as briefly and simply as possible (maximum of 30 seconds) –in a way that is polite and respectful.  You may find it helpful to write down your question to check whether it is worded briefly and powerfully.
• Please pose questions politely, and with respect for those who have different views.
• Please applaud questions with which you agree. This will give candidates an indication of how much time to spend on each question.
• The Moderator will try to take questions, as far as possible, from as wide a range of participants as possible.
• In order to cover a wide number of questions no time has been allocated to questioners responding to the answers given, other than through applause or lack of it.  However we encourage audience members to speak personally with candidates at the end of the hustings. 
• In order to make the job of the Moderator manageable, we will only be accepting questions from the audience in the building, and not from those on Zoom.