The by-elections just won’t stop coming as 13 were held in England and Wales this week. The Conservatives and Lib Dems are the only parties that had made gains (4 and 1 respectively), while all others had lost seats. Labour’s recent poor performances continue, holding only 3 out of their 6 seats while losing the other 3 to the Tories; the final blue gain comes from an independent seat. In Wales, Plaid Cymru lost their only seat this week to an independent.
The Lib Dems were the only party to have gained seats from the Tories. In the Old Dean ward in Surrey Heath BC, where no Lib Dem candidate stood in the last election, Cllr Dave Hough managed to snatch the seat with an impressive margin of victory. In stark contrast, both the Labour and Conservative vote plummeted. Huge well done and congrats to Dave and the local team for treading new ground and fighting hard for this win!
Surrey Heath BC, Old Dean
Liberal Democrat (Dave Hough): 394 (44.7%, new)
Conservative: 278 (31.6%, -27.3%)
Reform: 109 (12.4%, new)
Labour: 96 (10.9%, -30.2%)
Independent: 4 (0.5%, new)
The Lib Dems were also the only party to have held all seats that they have defended. In Gateshead MBC, Cllr Susan Craig achieved a dominating victory by further growing the Lib Dem vote share to 64.6%, being the only candidate do have gained a significant amount of votes. Congratulations and thank you to Susan and the team for putting the hard work in Whickham North.
Gateshead MBC, Whickham North
Liberal Democrat (Susan Craig): 902 (64.6%, +6.7%)
Labour: 285 (20.4%, -6.3%)
Conservative: 137 (9.8%, +0.9%)
Green Party: 72 (5.2%, -1.3%)
The other hold by the Lib Dems comes from the Histon and Impington ward in South Cambridgeshire DC, where Cllr James Rixon maintained healthy 320 vote lead from the second place independent. The only constant between all seems to be that Labour’s vote share has collapsed. Congrats to James and the local team for putting in the work to retain this Lib Dem seat!
South Cambridgeshire DC, Histon & Impington
Liberal Democrat (James Rixon): 942 (38.7%, -2.3%)
Independent: 617 (25.3%, +4.1%)
Green: 420 (17.3%, +5.8%)
Conservative: 283 (11.6%, -0.1%)
Labour: 172 (7.1%, -7.4%)
The final by-election highlight by the Lib Dems can be seen in New Forest DC. In the Barton & Becton ward, Wynford Davies almost doubled the vote to the Lib Dems, making the Tories work hard for the seat, a tight race indeed. Well done and thank you to Wynford and the local team for putting up such a good fight, you’ll get them next time.
New Forest DC, Barton & Becton – 24 October 2024
Conservative: 671 (57.1%, +3.6%)
Liberal Democrat (Wynford Davies): 505 (42.9%, +20.2%)
For a full summary of these results, and all other principal council by-elections, please refer to the ALDC by-elections page here.
* Matthew Ma works in the Campaigns and Communications team at ALDC
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
How four bison brought new life to ancient woodland in Kent
Lib Dems pick Richard Kilpatrick as candidate for the Greater Manchester Mayoral election
David Evans
Matt Wardman
Peter Martin
expats
4 Comments
Deadcat politics seem to apply to the reporting of election results. Look at this great win. Don’t look over there at that Con gain from LibDem. Nothing to see there. Yet, in the past 3 weeks we have lost 3 seats to the Conservatives, two of which were in LibDem constituencies. The Conservatives seem to be winning seats from Labour too, yet no-one is saying anything about this, or at least not in public. Here are the Tories, in total disarray, nationally, with two appalling right wingers vying to be leader and yet where real votes are being counted, they are gaining seats. Has anyone any suggestions as to why or more importantly, what we should be doing to stop them winning seats off us?
The Tories WILL win back highly unlikely local gains we made from them in the depths of their governments’ unpopularity. I wouldn’t draw catastrophic conclusions from a few by-election losses of that type.
It would be helpful to include losing results in this weekly report. They are sometimes the most illuminating of electoral realities.
Overall, we are doing pretty well currently and making headway in some Labour facing seats.
I don’t think Mick Taylor did draw catastrophic conclusions. He drew attention to one outcome of recent local elections and asked why there was no comment on them. A valid point.