Gareth Lewis: Strong views from Barry battleground

Café owner Sarah Powney says she thinks politicians are "all the same"

"They’re all glorified salesman - actually glorified Del Boys. There put that in."

"They all say they’ll do stuff but they never do."

"I am thinking of spoiling my ballot and that is a big step."

It is fair to say that people on Barry's High Street are not enamoured with their choice on 4 July, if Sarah, Bryan and Bob are anything to go by.

But that doesn’t mean they’re not informed. Far from it.

The people we spoke to knew what they thought, knew what they wanted, and also knew that the Vale of Glamorgan constituency is one of the big battlegrounds.

The Conservatives - who’ve held the seat since 2010 - are being pushed very hard by Labour - other parties are, of course, available.

All campaign trails seem to lead to the Vale.

So much so that the PM was here on day one - he visited a brewery in Barry within 24 hours of calling the election.

The prime minister visited Vale of Glamorgan Brewery, in Barry, the day after calling the election

A week later Sir Keir Starmer served ice cream in the sun on Barry Island.

So are voters on the patch impressed?

Sarah Powney, who runs the Heavenly Vegan café, was the person who made the above Del Boy comment, and said she was not much taken by Mr Sunak’s revelation that his family had to make do without Sky TV when he was growing up.

"He’s asked what they did without and he says Sky TV. Sky TV? I mean, well…" she said with a frown.

"They’re all the same. They say they’ll do this and they’ll do that but they’ve had years, so why haven’t they done it before?"

Butcher and former policeman Bryan Blatchford says he wants more police on the streets

Just along the street, former policeman Bryan Blatchford is now working as a butcher.

Perhaps not surprisingly he wants to see more police on the streets.

"I’ve been working here a year and I’ve seen two police walk past in all that time," he said.

One of his customers, who tells me her name is Karen, interjected with a cackle: "On their lunch hour were they?"

'Full of wind, no conviction'

Next door, florist Kelly Knight was busy in the middle of arranging a display and didn’t put much stock in what politicians say.

"I saw a really good thing the other day when one of the burger companies had an ad on the side of a bus that said ‘here’s another big whopper on the side of a bus’.

"That was brilliant," she said.

"I will vote because I’m a woman and, without going into it, women have suffered for the vote - but it is hard to choose."

Florist Kelly Knight says she will vote because women suffered for the right, but it's hard to pick who for

Bob Armstrong runs a balloon business on High Street and stopped inflating two blue balloons when we walked in - and opted for politically neutral colours instead.

He said he would not be voting Conservative, but also thought Keir Starmer was "full of wind and has no conviction at all".

Bob described himself as a "true socialist at heart" but said "a lot of people have been taking about Reform".

"I’m not sure about that. I will have a little look on the day and see how I feel because at the moment I feel like spoiling my vote.

"That’s how strong I feel about it."

The winning party in Vale of Glamorgan has formed or led the UK government after every general election since 1992.

Winning here quite obviously counts.

Every vote here will count.

The people we spoke to understood that.

Whether they feel like they count to politicians appears to be another matter.

The general election candidates for the Vale of Glamorgan constituency are:

Conservative - Alun Cairns

Abolish the Welsh Assembly Party - Stuart Field

Plaid Cymru - Ian Johnson

Green - Lynden Mack

Labour - Kanishka Narayan

Liberal Democrat - Steven Rajam

Reform UK - Toby Rhodes-Matthews

Independent - Steven Sluman