We can finally and happily confirm that we will have a mailout to the constituency after many stressful conversations to meet ridiculous deadlines.

Despite my correct address in Bury being supplied to printwize, their courier decided to go to Bolton instead yesterday, so they did not arrive on time. As you can imagine, myself and Loz were not at all pleased yesterday evening. Loz woke me up this morning after receiving a phone call from the courier saying that we could receive it around 1pm or pick it up in Stockport, so with the Royal Mail deadline being 12pm today, we had no choice but to go to Stockport to collect 50,000 leaflets.

Fortunately Loz managed to get hold of a friend of his who was able to take him into Stockport to collect the leaflets and take them to the Royal Mail depot in Oldham, and Loz was able to separate them into the required bundles before 12pm and we were able to meet the deadline at the last minute.

The next task is to get help from our members on foot in Oldham and Saddleworth to gather support for the campaign. We will definitely be out on 3rd and 8th January and any other day we can. What we also need from those who cant come and help us in Oldham is for people to get in contact with local business groups and community groups to arrange meetings with Loz and interviews. Dont look for approval, just send me an email or txt when it is done, the more the merrier.

I need confirmation from those wanting to be counting and polling agents, we would like to get as close to the 37 agent limit as possible for the count and at the moment we only have a handful confirmed. I need you to email me at g.lambert@pirateparty.org.uk or txt me at 07538082246 if you want to come with your name and the address for Oldham council to send your pass too, which you need to get into the count. We will provide you with accommodation, bring a sleeping bag for it to be comfortable accommodation! The sooner you book transport like train journeys the better and cheaper it will be. We may be able to assist with the costs, just ask!

If you have any questions about the campaign, just contact me ...

On Thursday 13th January we will have a world first, a Pirate Member of Parliament. Did you just laugh or rubbish that statement? Well, I don't want your help. If you didn't and you do genuinely believe that we have a chance of winning the Oldham East & Saddleworth by-election, albeit an outside chance, I want to hear from you as soon as possible.

On polling day, we can have an unlimited amount of polling agents, however we are limited to 1 person at each polling station. I am going to research into what the polling agents can actually do or wear at the polling stations, but I would like as many people as possible to say they will come to Oldham or Saddleworth and be a polling agent, it will be good experience for everyone.

We have been told that the maximum counting agents we can have is 37. If we can have 37 people there with PPUK t-shirts on under their suits along with me, with Loz there in his suit with Pirate rosette, I will be very, very happy. Having 39 Pirates in the same room at this count would be unbelievable and I think we can do this.

If you are interested in being a polling agent or a counting agent or both, please email me at g.lambert@pirateparty.org.uk or text me at 07538082246 and I'll give you a call when I can (I'm very busy at work this week, so please don't ring out of the blue, and make sure you leave your name in the text so I know who you are).

Myself and Loz attended the candidate and agent briefing on Thursday 23rd December, I don't know why they don't just call it the agent briefing because Loz was the only candidate in the room. The Acting Returning Officer said, "We have been informed by Royal Mail that candidates wishing to utilize the free constituency mailout must contact them as soon as possible to make arrangements.". I can tell you now that, unless it is an addressed mailout, Thursday was the deadline for getting things sorted. This is because of the Christmas break being slap-bang in the middle of the campaigning period. The deadline at Royal Mail for unaddressed mail-outs is Friday 31st December 2010. Due to most businesses ceasing trading on 23rd until ...

We'd like to thank all of the people that have kindly donated money to our campaign funds for the General Election.  At the time of putting our progress bar online yesterday, we had £300 donated.  At the time of writing this blog, we have £2513.98, which is 5 candidate's deposits paid for or 3 constituency mailouts paid for.

This is fantastic progress in such a short space of time! We really do need the donations to keep on coming, though.  We need a further £4,500 to fund our candidates with mailouts and deposits, and anything more than that will go towards campaign funds for each candidate.

Last night, the Digital Economy Bill was passed through the Commons and will soon become the Digital Economy Act.  The Pirate Party UK strongly opposes the Bill/Act and will continue to do so when it becomes UK law.  We are the only political party in the country that publicly opposes it.

If you want to make a big difference and you can't vote for our candidates, please donate whatever you can afford so that we have the best chance possible to get a Pirate Party UK MP out of next month's General Election. If you live near one of our target constituencies, why not help with our campaign, by getting involved with canvassing or publicity?You can visit our donation page to make a contribution.

Graeme Lambert is the Pirate Party PPC for Bury North.