Well, well. Only three by-elections tonight and we’ve won two of them
One was a solid hold in Taunton Deane, where we lost the parliamentary seat last May.
Taunton Halcon (Taunton Deane) vote result:
LDEM: 389
CON: 222
LAB: 133
UKIP: 118
GRN: 42— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 14, 2016
Taunton Halcon (Taunton Deane) result:
LDEM: 43.0% (+2.7)
CON: 24.6% (-11.0)
LAB: 14.7% (+14.7)
UKIP: 13.1% (+13.1)
GRN: 4.6% (-19.5)— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 14, 2016
Our vote went up despite the presence of a Labour candidate, The Greens have really fallen out of favour.
But better news was to come. We gained a seat in Cornwall.
Wadebridge West (Cornwall) vote result:
LDEM: 604
CON: 356
LAB: 222
IND: 111
GRN: 95— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 14, 2016
Wadebridge West (Cornwall) result:
LDEM: 43.5% (+19.2)
CON: 25.6% (-39.9)
LAB: 16.0% (+5.8)
IND: 8.0% (+8.0)
GRN: 6.8% (+6.8)— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 14, 2016
The Tories really tanked. There must be a story around why they lost almost 40% of their vote. That was in the seat held by Dan Rogerson till May.
This certainly shows that the Liberal Democrats are still alive kicking and wining in the West Country.
Congratulations to our new Councillors Chris Booth and Karen McHugh and their campaign teams.
We didn’t manage the treble though – the final by-election, also in Cornwall, saw a Conservative hold. But only just. We missed out by just 60 votes with another strong increase.
Menheniot (Cornwall) result:
CON: 40.5% (+2.5)
LDEM: 35.9% (+11.6)
UKIP: 13.5% (-17.7)
LAB: 5.1% (+5.1)
GRN: 5.0% (-1.5)— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 14, 2016
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings. You can find her on Bluesky at caronmlindsay.bsky.social
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20 Comments
Can we get the results for the third seat?
As great as it is, I’d like to see negative as well as positive results so we can get a clear view of where we are electorally. I’d also like to see Tim and co. really getting to the big economic issues as well as his great work on the refugee crisis. Particularly I think we need to go beyond issues like shortlists (unsure) and legal weed (support), as interesting to Lib Dems as they may be, if we’re to start connecting with normal people.
Well done to the all three teams for putting a candidate up and the two winners and I am sorry for the third candidate. Been there and done it over the last 37 years.
Perhaps it is because that, while our vote in Menheniot increased and we came close to victory, the increase in our share appears to be direct transfers from UKIP!
Here is the other cornwall result
Menheniot
Vote %. Change %
Lib dem 472. 35.9. 11.5+
Con. 532. 40.5. 2.5+
Ukip. 177. 13.5. 17.7-
Green. 65. 5.0. 1.4-
Lab. 67. 5.1. 5.1+
1313
Think the people of North Cornwall are missing Dan Rogerson. The Wadebridge by-election was caused by the recent resignation of Conservative MP, Scott Mann.
Conor – that was it last night – only three prinicipal authority by-elections.
There were no others, bad or otherwise.
Only anecdotal evidence …… BUT the improving trend seen in by-elections … i was on the phone bank Wednesday evening at Party HQ calling for London Mayor/Assembly elections, a much,much more positive response than a year ago running upto the General. Those sitting around me also feeling positive vibes from those being called 🙂
In response to post by Conor above, tell me what your definition of ‘normal person’ is !! Of course bread and butter issues matter, BUT any party could say the same on a bread and butter issue, what first inspired me ( or made me realise the person inside me was a liberal) was the parties concern for human rights, minorities, equality etc To many voters these are issues that mark us out
There is a tendency to report results without the turnout and the actual result last time, which tells you a lot about what has changed, particularly if lots of people have just not voted. When Halycon ward was fought in 2015 it had 3 Lib Dem candidates, 2 Conservatives and 1 Green. Two Lib Dems and one Conservative were elected. The Lib Dem share of the vote was 55.3%, Cons 33.1 Green 11.5 so the % change figures are wrong. (or calculated using only the top candidate for each party)
Without wishing to knock the result, which is clearly still impressive given the different circumstances, it is not some massive swing to the Lib Dems.
Halcon Ward (3 Seats)
APPLEBY, Christopher Liberal Democrat 1012, 19.28% Elected
SMITH, Federica, Roberta, Diana Liberal Democrat 1001, 19.07% Elected
RYAN, Roger, Michael The Conservative Party 891, 16.97% Elected
SLATTERY, Timothy, Joseph Liberal Democrat 889, 16.94%
GRANT, Livvi The Conservative Party 851, 16.21%
MARSDEN, Clare, Frances The Green Party 605, 11.53%
Turnout = 61.2 %
Wadebridge has a fantastic and thriving energy set up based on renewables. Tory assault on green energy must have played very badly there?
As David Cox notes, Wadebridge West was held by Tory Scott Mann for many years and he is now MP for North Cornwall. So this result must be a heavy blow for the local Tories. Result in 2013 was:
West – CON HOLD
Scott Mann, Con 830
Elliot Osborne, LD 308
John Whitby, Lab 129
Turnout 41.64%
Read more: http://www.westbriton.co.uk/LIVE-Cornwall-election-results/story-18880853-detail/story.html#ixzz45tVTQ5JI
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The Wadebridge turnout was impressive and higher than expected. Taking the seat from the Tories was important to show them that despite it previously being Manns they do not and will not keep a hold on Cornwall.
Peter, I agree we need to be proud of our core beliefs and policy ambitions, things like civil liberties and eco policy brought me into the party too… But I think we need to match that with stuff on the economy, taxes, integration, public services etc. if we want to build upon our core support of c. 10%.
– The “normal people” remark wasn’t meant to be taken too much to heart, if anything more vocal odd people around would be good nowadays 😉 I mean average undecided voters.
This is good news. What I have been hoping is that in areas where we are well known our vote will go up significantly now because the Tories are revealing their true colours. I am sure that our % vote nationally won’t change much at present but in May we have a chance of winning more seats than this might indicate if people are beginning to realise we did have some influence on Coalition policies. I think in 2015 people just thought the Tories aren’t so bad and left wing voters didn’t think there was any point in voting for us any more even in areas where we had MPs.
Thank you Cornwall for giving us some optimism just in time for May.
Yesterdays poll in the Times had us at 8% and UKIP at 17%. Yet this years local elections seem to produce the reverse sort of results, it is strange. See how it turns out in 3 weeks, I still think we on course for net gains 50 – 100.
Excellent results from our teams in the west country. Congratulations to them all.
Results from not-so-sunny Exmouth (today, and yesterday evening – Polling Day). Here we fight our Town Council elections through parties. Yesterday two of our wards were contested, following the resignations of two Tory councillors newly elected last year.
Results were as follows:
Exmouth Halsdon
Pauline Garbutt Lib Dem 764
Khristine Norton Tory 407
A massive swing in a normally Tory dominated ward.
Exmouth Littleham
Bruce de Saram Tory 529
Paul Rapley Independent (East Devon Alliance) 428
Sue Brooks Lib Dem 313
Keith Edwards Labour 170
A very creditable increase in a ward where we have recently found it hard to find candidates.
Thank you Peter Kemp and others who have joined the team calling for Caroline Pidgeon and London Liberal Democrats – I hope you enjoyed it and the Pizza!
And if others can join in at Party HQ there’s phoning on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday this week – see here for the details. We need all hands on deck – well on the phones anyway!
http://www.londonlibdems.org.uk/events