My analysis of by-elections from the week beginning 9/3/20

Readers, the results of British local by-elections from the week beginning 9 March 2020 were as follows:

 (10/3/20)

 Wiltshire UA, Till & Wylye Valley: Conservative 637 (49.6%, -4.6%), Liberal Democrats 623 (48.5%, +4.4%), Labour 24 (1.9%).

 (12/3/20)

 Ashford DC, Park Farm North: Ashford Independents 247 (60.2%), Conservative 115 (28.0%, -33.4%), Labour 29 (7.1%, -12.8%), Green 11 (2.7%), Liberal Democrats 8 (2.0%, -16.7%). Ashford Independents gain from Conservative.

 Highland UA, Eilean Cheo (1st preferences): Independent (Murdo) 911 (28.5%), SNP 874 (27.3%), Liberal Democrats 698 (21.8%), Green 357 (11.6%), Conservative 314 (9.8%), Martainn Misreachd 45 (1.4%). Independent gain from another Independent at stage 5. [Some other Independents did not stand]

 South Somerset DC, Parnett: Liberal Democrats 387 (52.0%, -12.5%), Conservative 162 (21.8%, -13.7%), Independent (Ashton) 160 (21.5%), Green 35 (4.7%).

 Stratford on Avon DC, Welford on Avon: Liberal Democrats 472 (43.6%), Conservative 323 (29.9%, +8.7%), Independent (Appleton) 231 (21.3%), Labour 41 (3.8%, -1.5%), Green 15 (1.4%, -7.1%). Liberal Democrat gain from Independent.

 This has been the Conservatives' worst week so far in local by-elections this year, and the Conservatives' lax attitude to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak is partly responsible. Tuesday's by-election in Wiltshire is an exercise in how tactical voting can only go so far, with the "plateau effect" (first seen in the 1983 general election) proving to be a serious problem for the Liberal Democrats there. All the Labour-vote squeezing was not enough for them in Till & Wylye Valley, consisting of villages near Salisbury. 

 Local Independents (and in some places, locally known Greens) often find it easier to defeat the Conservatives in rural areas than the Liberal Democrats in practice. The by-election in Park Farm North on the outskirts of Ashford was a notable example, with the Conservatives' selection of a former member of the Ashford Independents not helping them at all. The intervention of the Ashford Independents, true to form, caused the Liberal Democrat and Green votes to plummet; occasions where the Liberal Democrats or indeed any major political party achieving fewer votes than the number of signatures needed to stand for election (i.e. 10) are rare in the extreme. Even though they did not win, local independents also polled well in Parnett near Yeovil and Welford on Avon near Stratford-upon-Avon, although in the latter case the Liberal Democrats had the advantage because Welford on Avon was in fact represented by a long-serving Liberal Democrat councillor, Peter Barnes, who in the last 5 years of his tenure sat as an Independent; Mr Barnes' death caused the by-election in question.

 With the UK Electoral Commission having recently written to Constitution Minister Chloe Smith (Conservative MP for Norwich North since 2009) recommending the postponing of this May's local elections due to the impact of the coronavirus outbreak, I will say now that COVID-19 will likely have a significant impact on this blog, as local by-elections may be cancelled as well. In fact, there will be no Green Party conference review this Spring as said Spring Conference has been cancelled, again due to concerns about the coronavirus outbreak (in fact, the Spring Conferences of all other significant political parties in the UK have been cancelled for the same reason).

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

My analysis of local by-elections from 22/11/18

Readers, the results of this week's British local by-elections were as follows: Enfield LBC, Bush Hill Park: Conservative 1540 (52.4%, +12.7%), Labour 828 (28.2%, -8.3%), Liberal Democrats 313 (10.7%, -0.8%), Green 127 (4.3%, -6.6%), WEP 79 (2.7%), Independent (Oyaloyu) 50 (1.7%). [UKIP did not stand] Westminster LBC, Lancaster Gate: Conservative 913 (47.2%, -1.5%), Labour 684 (35.4%, -1.0%), Liberal Democrats 275 (14.2%, -0.7%), Green 62 (3.2%). Windsor & Maidenhead UA, Datchet: Conservative 525 (56.0%, -3.1%), National Flood Prevention Party 223 (23.8%), Labour 121 (12.9%, -9.1%), Liberal Democrats 48 (5.1%,-13.8%), Green 21 (2.2%). Wirral MBC, Upton: Labour 1490 (61.3%, +3.1%), Conservative 705 (29.0%, +0.4%), Green 151 (6.2%, -0.5%), Liberal Democrats 83 (3.4%, -0.8%). [TUSC did not stand] All changes are since May. The open divisions in the Conservatives, which resulted in a failed attempt to call for a vote of no confidence in Theresa May by the European Researc...
Read more

On the 2020 Serbian election: Why a boycott will only worsen things there

First of all, I apologise for the recent hiatus; however elections are still postponed or on hold in many countries, including the UK. Serbia, however, was able to proceed with its 2020 general election amidst this crisis. Its overall result proved reminiscent of Hungarian elections under Viktor Orban's tenure (2010-present), since the leading national-conservative coalition, the SNS (Progressive Party of Serbia) coalition led by Serbian President Aleksander Vucic (Ana Brnabic is the Serbian Prime Minister, and the first woman and openly homosexual person to hold that position), polled 61.6% of the vote, giving them as many as 191 seats out of 250 and a majority of as high as 132, almost unheard of in any country with proportional representation. Press freedom has endured significant curbs since President Vucic first came into power as Serbian PM in 2012 (he became President of Serbia in 2017), as have civil liberties of Serbs in general. Nepotism and corruption in the Serbian ...
Read more

On the French local elections of 2020: Vive le surge de vert!

The French local elections finally concluded yesterday, having been originally scheduled to take place on 15 March; they were postponed due to the effects of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.  The most sensational story of these elections was the many triumphs by the main French Green Party, Europe Ecologie-Les Verts (EELV). In major French cities (those with more than 100,000 people), EELV captured the mayoralties of Annecy, Besancon, Bordeaux, Lyon, Marseille, Strasbourg, and Tours. They also performed impressively in the munciipal elections for those cities as well. However, in the midst of all this triumph there was one notable setback for them: Eric Pollie, the first Green Mayor of a major French city, decided to contest the mayoral election there as an "Independent Left" (divers gauche) candidate instead. Furthermore they narrowly missed out on unseating former PS leader Martine Aubry from her post as Mayor of Lille; in the second round she held on by 227 votes, a sig...
Read more