Excellent news.
Nicholas Pentney, the son of Ruth, who was Adrian Sanders’ long time agent and who sadly died last year, has won the Tormahun by-election in Torbay.
It’s unusually to get this sort of news on a Sunday morning, but the result has just been declared:
Terrific news from the Torbay by-election – @NicholasPentney GAINS from the Conservatives. https://t.co/d88JUk13yJ
— Liberal Democrats (@LibDems) May 8, 2016
Congratulations to all the team.
This is the second by-election victory in Torbay in recent months. Adrian Sanders, former Liberal Democrat MP for Torbay, won Ruth’s seat in the by-election following her death in November.
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6 Comments
Brilliant news, following other byelection successes in Devon and Cornwall recently (Wadebridge, Exmouth and swings to us in pretty well every one we have contested.)
Also good news is that Torbay have voted to abolish their elected Mayor.
Mayoral Referendum – Torbay UA 5 May 2016
(Change in percentahe vote since the 14 July 2005 referendum)
Keep the elected Mayor 9,511 38% (-17%)
Move to a Leader & Cabinet system 15,846 62% (17%)
A much larger majority against the elected mayoral system after 11 years and two elected mayors than voted for the system in the first place.
From 2019 Torbay will revert to a Leader & Cabinet System
Tormohun by-election Torbay UA 5 May 2016
Seat: Conservative
Cause: Resignation
(Change in percentage of vote since May 2015 in brackets)
Labour 44 14.3% (-4.1%)
Trade Union Socialists Against Cuts 27 0.8% (0.8%)
Green 66 2.7% (-9.5%)
Nick Pentney Liberal Democrat 1126 47% (21.6%)
Conservative 533 22.1% (-3.0%
UKIP 315 13.1% (-5.8%)
Turnout 29.8%
Liberal Democrat GAIN from Conservative
I understand we have also won the first seat declared in Bristol. New boundaries – notionally Green in 2015.
Nick spoke at our Wiltshire Members Conference yesterday where we celebrated the victory in a by-election on Thursday of 20 year old LSE student Jamie Capp to become the youngest Wiltshire Councillor ever! Jamie won Amesbury East. That’s a Ward we did not even contest in 2013 when the Tories beat UKIP by 20. The swing to Jamie from the Cons was over 21%! Nick thought he might be OK in his by-election. Delighted to se he was right!
Another blow to the Conservative approach to devolution (“You can have devolution but only if you do it precisely the way we know is best for you, with an elected mayor etc etc etc etc”).