So you're a Labour Party member and you want to lose Hartlepool. The room echoes with Laughter. "It couldn't be done", "Lock him up", Sorry Kier but you've had one too many tonight.
But you're determined to show these doubters that you can lose Hartlepool. They have underestimated you. You will show them!
Step (1) Elect a Leader
Elect a new Leader. The last one increased turnout by inspiring hope in both the members and the general public. This will ruin your chances of losing Hartlepool.
Find a knighted Oxford-educated former civil servant type. A Typical Politician. Either with an undergrad in Law or History. You are looking for the mean of all politicians. Make sure he wears the same Saville Row suits and has the same haircuts. Make sure he runs a cyclist off the road in a big Rangerover. The last guy was so popular the public crowdsourced him a bicycle. You won't want anythone like that.
Step (2) Sack the Popular Socialists
Sack them all! Start with that Ian Lavery fella. He made the position of Party Chairman his own. Never has a Chairman had such popularity. In fact, he is the only Party Chairman any member can remember by name and he lives near Hartlepool. He would gain way too many votes for that seat just by being spotted at the local flapping track. Sack all the Corbyn Era Socialists and if the unions threaten to take away the funds then hold onto Rebecca Long-Bailey for a few months and sack her for antisemitism. You can always use antisemitism. Them Jews in Gateshead haven't a voice so don't worry about taking them for granted.
Step (3) Elect a truly uninspiring Cabinet. Think 1970's Beige.
Everyone hates Beige. So that's what we go for. Hire the worst of the bunch. Find a shadow chancellor who is so out of touch with the public they would suggest sacking millions of people after the Tories saved them in a crisis with a Furlough scheme. Then the rest, well any insignificant MP you can control whose name nobody will remember.
Step (4) Attack your volunteers and funders
OK, so this is the big yin. Go right after the very people who fund the Labour Party and work hard to win the party the votes. They have proven in the last two elections that if they are inspired they will raise more funds than the bloody Tories and get out record-breaking electorates. We can't let that happen.
You must find the key organisers among the grassroots Labour volunteer network in each area and suspend them. Just use Antisemitism if you can't find a reason. A Lobby group is already set up to make false complaints against the best of Labours volunteer leaders.
Step (5) Destroy Morale
So now you have suspended all the volunteer leaders who normally organise busses and remote campaign groups for by-elections you need to increase the pressure and crush their morale. You see you just energised them and they have found that winning fight that can swing elections and turned it against you. To keep your grip on the party so nobody else takes over and wins Hartlepool you need to crush them. They are full of hope from Jeremy so it will take some extreme effort. Consider the following:
Sack Corbyn (Oh yes)
Bury the Forde Enquiry
Change the NEC election Rules to Stack it with Right-Wingers
Bully out Scottish Labour Leader. He is too nice.
Replace Welsh Leader with someone you can control
Publicly pay a £0.5m Bribe to staff who undermined Labour in previous GE's
Blow Hundreds of thousands of pounds being sued by members
Alienate Unite. They might dock a half-million or so from the subs if you are lucky.
Step (6) Select your candidate
Now it's time to select your candidate. Find a candidate who is a typical politician just like you. Try especially hard to find a careerist politician because the people hate them. An ex-MP would be perfect. You're going to need to alienate every single vote for this so leave nothing to chance. Someone from a neighbouring constituency will help because the people can not stand a Carpetbagger being parachuted in. Perhaps a pro-Nuclear, Pro-War candidate will rub up those volunteers some more. Thats what is key. No volunteers and then things return to the status quo with the press choosing the Government. Every twenty or so years we get our turn. Slip out emails to the press showing you pre-selected the candidate too. Then once you have your candidate hold a fake application process for one day with no real advertisement. You don't want any applications as that would make explanations tricky after you lose so advertise the position on an obscure webpage and don't send anything out through emails or social media to members. Once you have closed applications hold a "shortlisting" session with a sub-committee of the NEC so you can pretend it was a legitimate process. Finally, declare a shortlist of one candidate. That's the genius bit. Now you have an illegitimate candidate that will alienate the entire volunteer network in the North region. Nobody will bus in for this one.
You Did It!
Now you are set up perfectly to lose Hartlepool. It's not going to be easy but if you do all of this and Boris doesn't Nuke the South East of England you could possibly lose Hartlepool. Be sure to get out in the press talking rubbish about how Hartlepool could go and getting ahead of the inevitable calls for resignation or your heads on the block. Good Luck Kier!