UK local by-elections 2013

[Leftbehind]

A good Labour result in Newtown (or at least a fair improvement on their lacklustre 2011 performance), but an awful Primrose result (worse than their 2007 share, and even that had a respectable Green result).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Primrose is weird: although always safe (and was again last night), it doesn't often produce utterly lopsided results as it did in 2012. The BNP polled respectably - and made a serious run in a previous by-election - until it collapsed.

[freefair]

3 cases of a UKIP spoiler effect there.  Ouch.

[MaxQue]

Health Concern still exists? I through they would collapse after losing their Westminister seat.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Few things make sense in that small part of the world.

[ObserverIE]

Broadland, Aylsham

Lib Dem 50.0 (+19.9)
Con 36.4 (-2.6)
Lab 13.7 (-2.8)

Newcastle-under-Lyme, Silverdale and Parksite

Lab 54.3 (+7.9)
UKIP 35.6 (-6.9)
Con 8.1 (-2.9)
TUSC 2.0 (+2.0)

Swansea, Llansamlet

Lab 75.0 (+13.2)
Con 12.9 (+2.9)
Lib Dem 6.2 (+6.2)
NF 5.9 (+5.9)

Vale of White Horse, Abingdon Fitzharris

Lib Dem 50.3 (+8.4)
Con 39.7 (-0.4)
Lab 10.1 (-7.9)

North Tyneside, Riverside

Lab 85.6 (+1.0)
Con 14.4 (-1.0)

Lib Dem gain two from Con (Aylsham, Abingdon Fitzharris)

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The new councillor for Llansamlet is none other than Bob Clay, the extremely left-wing former MP for Sunderland North.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Anyway, that's a great result in Silverdale.

[Leftbehind]

Anyway, that's a great result in Silverdale.

Strong results in N Tyneside and Swansea as well for Labour, although poor results in Broadland & VOWH where they unwound to Liberals.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Imagine that you're quite delighted with the result in Swansea? Bob Clay is going to have such seriously weird obituaries.

[Leftbehind]

Indeed! Although these sort of reappearances at the local level are always dampened with the reminder they're no longer in parliament (which desperately needs more hard leftists).

[ObserverIE]

North Kesteven, Sleaford Holdingham

Ind Jackson 37.6
Lab 21.2 (+21.2)
Ind Fernandes 15.3
Con 12.9 (-22.2)
UKIP 12.9 (+12.9)

(Conservatives and UKIP got exactly the same number of votes)

Brighton and Hove, Hanover and Elm Grove

Lab 39.8 (+8.0)
Green 38.7 (-14.5)
Con 7.8 (-1.1)
UKIP 7.1 (+7.1)
TUSC 4.9 (+1.9)
Lib Dem 1.6 (-1.5)

Conwy, Caerhun

Ind 42.1 (+2.1)
Con 22.3 (-18.3)
PC 21.3 (+1.9)
Lab 14.3 (+14.3)

Forest Heath, Exning

Ind 64.1
Con 35.9 (-8.0)

Inds regain Caerhun, retain Sleaford Holdingham, gain Exning from Lib Dem (seat not defended).

Lab gains Hanover & Elm Grove from Green.

[You kip if you want to...]

Aren't the Brighton Greens going through a really rough patch at the moment?

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

Forgive my ignorance of British politics, but isn't Brighton and Hove already represented by the only elected Green in the commons? Or is Lucas representing another constituency in the general area?

[YL]

Forgive my ignorance of British politics, but isn't Brighton and Hove already represented by the only elected Green in the commons? Or is Lucas representing another constituency in the general area?

She represents Brighton Pavilion, which is one of three constituencies covering Brighton and Hove, and which includes this ward.  The other two constituencies, Brighton Kemptown and Hove, are both Tory-held marginals.

The Green council seems to be a disaster and consumed by factional infighting between "mangos" and "watermelons".  To add to the food theme the Council leader's surname is Kitcat.  Someone who knows the area better may be able to explain more.

[Serenity Now]

Forgive my ignorance of British politics, but isn't Brighton and Hove already represented by the only elected Green in the commons? Or is Lucas representing another constituency in the general area?

She represents Brighton Pavilion, which is one of three constituencies covering Brighton and Hove, and which includes this ward.  The other two constituencies, Brighton Kemptown and Hove, are both Tory-held marginals.

The Green council seems to be a disaster and consumed by factional infighting between "mangos" and "watermelons".  To add to the food theme the Council leader's surname is Kitcat.  Someone who knows the area better may be able to explain more.

The main issue, at least in terms of this by-election, is the strike by the Cityclean (refuse and recycling) workers, and the events surrounding it. 

It started with the Green administration (well, the Green Councillors on the Policy and Resources Committee, with the backing of the Tories, and with Labour opposing) voting to hand over negotiations over pay and allowances to the council officers.  Whatever their intention, the effect was that many highly contentious potential political decisions were handed over to unelected officials. One group particularly affected by the proposed changes (along with care workers) were refuse and recycling workers, whose pay structure has been seen as archaic by council management for many years.  Whatever the details of the proposed reforms, the feeling of the Cityclean workers and their union (the GMB) was that many of them would face a significant reduction in their take home pay.

In the UK generally, refuse workers have the archaic qualities of being manual workers who almost earn a median average wage (shock horror!) and are actively unionised.  This isn't a great group for the management of a council - let alone an elected administration - to pick a fight with, as if they withdraw their labour they have an immediate and visible affect in that the city quickly gets covered in rubbish.  This is what happened, for a couple of weeks or so (can't remember), until the proposal was more or less reversed, with some caveats.  I would argue the Green administration should've seen this coming in the first place, and that it was politically naive of them not to have done so.

Whilst not from the best journalistic source, this is what it looked like: http://www.heart.co.uk/sussex/news/local/brighton-and-hove-bin-strike

At the same time, many Councillors, Green Party members, and the local Green MP Caroline Lucas, actively and publicly supported the striking workers, and it is a alleged that some Green Councillors attempted to oust their leader (Cllr Jason Kitcat).  This fed into the wide public perception that the local Green administration, and broader membership locally, were somewhat divided.

Hanover and Elm Grove is a city centre ward (which I lived in for two years) where recycling and refuse is already an issue, due to the relatively transient population, large number of houses of multiple occupation, and reliance on communal bins.  Although everywhere in the city was affected, this ward would've been particularly badly affected (in fact, wards with Green Councillors would all have been disproportionately worse hit).  This is a very recent, and unpleasant memory, and so would've been on the mind of everyone who voted in yesterday's election.

What a mess.  The result was exactly what I'd predicted by the way, but anyone can claim that in retrospect.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Local authorities mess with binmen at their peril: quite a few administrations have picked fights with them and found themselves out of power not long after (Leeds was a particularly striking - ha, ha - case).

[Serenity Now]

Forgive my ignorance of British politics, but isn't Brighton and Hove already represented by the only elected Green in the commons? Or is Lucas representing another constituency in the general area?

Yes, that's correct, and furthermore, this ward is located within her constituency (and was their second or third safest).  I still think she can hold on in 2015, even if the Greens do terribly in the council elections that same day, as there could be a lot of ticket splitting.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Particularly if she's basically regarded as some kid of de facto independent of the Left (which is exactly what she is in Commons terms anyway)

[Leftbehind]

Indeed.

At the same time, many Councillors, Green Party members, and the local Green MP Caroline Lucas, actively and publicly supported the striking workers, and it is a alleged that some Green Councillors attempted to oust their leader (Cllr Jason Kitcat).  This fed into the wide public perception that the local Green administration, and broader membership locally, were somewhat divided.

[Serenity Now]

Particularly if she's basically regarded as some kid of de facto independent of the Left (which is exactly what she is in Commons terms anyway)

My thinking exactly, she'll certainly over-perform compared to Green council candidates within the Brighton Pavilion constituency.  There is a lot of fluidity between Green and Labour votes in Brighton (at least in certain places, Hanover and Elm Grove in particular).

[joevsimp]

Indeed.

At the same time, many Councillors, Green Party members, and the local Green MP Caroline Lucas, actively and publicly supported the striking workers, and it is a alleged that some Green Councillors attempted to oust their leader (Cllr Jason Kitcat).  This fed into the wide public perception that the local Green administration, and broader membership locally, were somewhat divided.

fat chance of that, Labour are having far too much fun with this, and it was them who voted with the tories to force through the budget cuts in the first place

[Chancellor of the Duchy of Little Lever and Darcy Lever]

Just two by-elections on 18th July 2013, both of which in settlements which have managed to remain obscure despite being the largest in their district by population.  Labour are defending a seat in Flintshire's largest town on the banks of the River Dee, while an Independent seat is up for grabs in the largest village of South Cambridgeshire district.


CONNAH'S QUAY GOLFTYN, Flintshire county council; caused by the death of Labour councillor Peter Macfarlane from liver cancer.  A former firefighter who served in the RAF, Cllr Macfarlane had first been elected to the now-abolished Alyn and Deeside district council and had served on Connah's Quay town council for 26 years.  He was Flintshire's cabinet member for regeneration, enterprise and leisure.


Perhaps surprisingly for those who may have never heard of it, Connah's Quay is Flintshire's largest town with a population of around 17,500.  The town is on the south bank of the River Dee, but its boundaries extend all the way to the English border in what was once the centre of the Dee estuary before the river was channeled and much of what had been the estuary silted up.

The gradual silting of the Dee has created an awful lot of reclaimed land.  On the English side of the boundary, the land just outside the Chester city walls where the Romans once moored their ships is now Chester Racecourse.  Further up on the Wirral is Parkgate, which is a long way from the shoreline now but still has a seafront which used to look out on the main channel of the Dee.  The quay at Connah's Quay itself had fallen victim to silt by the 1960s, but don't despair: the north bank of the Dee within the town boundary is all flat, reclaimed land and has been put to good industrial use: there is still a large steelworks on the north bank together with a very large industrial estate (Deeside Industrial Park) and a pair of gas-fired power stations, one on each bank.  Connah's Quay Power Station can be found on the south bank of the Dee at the western end of the town, which is also the part covered by Connah's Quay Golftyn division.  Linking the
two banks within the division is the Flintshire Bridge, an impressive cable-stayed structure which is a bit of a "road to nowhere", linking as it does an industrial area with Flint and Connah's Quay, and lacking a good link on the south side of the Dee to the main A55 road.

All this heavy industry makes Connah's Quay predisposed to vote Labour.  The Golftyn division returned two Labour councillors unopposed in 2004.  At the 2008 election Labour were opposed only by independent candidate Eric Owen, who topped the poll but served only one term before Labour regained his seat at the 2012 election.

This by-election will be another faceoff between Labour and Owen.  Labour's defending candidate is Connah's Quay town councillor Andy Dundobbin.  Eric Owen, one of two independent members of the town council, wants his county council seat back, and has been accused of scaremongering by Labour after raising concerns that street lights in the area could be turned off to save money.  Also nominated is the first Conservative candidate here for at least a decade, David Chamberlain-Jones from Buckley.

Parliamentary and Assembly constituency: Alyn and Deeside
Assembly electoral region: North Wales
ONS Travel to Work Area: Chester and Flint

David Chamberlain-Jones (C)
Andy Dundobbin (Lab)
Eric Owen (Ind)

May 2012 result Lab 582/553 Ind 382
May 2008 result Ind 544 Lab 412/328
June 2004 result 2 Lab unopposed


SAWSTON, South Cambridgeshire district council; caused by the resignation of Independent councillor Sally Hatton.

With 7,145 inhabitants according to the 2011 census, Sawston is the largest settlement in South Cambridgeshire district but still only has the status of a village.  In fact, South Cambridgeshire doesn't have any towns at all, the town functions in the area being fulfilled by Cambridge which forms a borough of its own.  This hasn't stopped the area having some spectacular population growth since the Second World War, but that growth has been absorbed not by building a new town but by adding bits and bobs and housing estates to the villages that already existed.  As well as Cambridge and London commuting, Sawston does have a little industry of its own, notably a large paper mill north-west of the village, next to the Liverpool Street-Cambridge railway line and the River Cam.

This industry (tanning was also important here) created a base Labour vote that was able to win Sawston ward on occasion during their zenith years.  The Conservatives gained Sawston from Labour in 2000 to hold all three seats in the ward.  Sally Hatton was first elected in 2003 in a close three-way fight with the Tories and Labour.  South Cambridgeshire was re-warded in 2004; while Sawston ward was unchanged, all its three seats were up for election that year and they split three ways, with Sally Hatton topping the poll, the Tories coming in second and Labour winning a close fight for the final seat.  The Labour seat was promptly lost back to the Conservatives in 2006, but in the two attempts since then the Tories failed to dislodge Hatton, who was re-elected by 38 votes at the 2008 election (at which she was not opposed by Labour) and by 30 votes in 2012.  Hatton's resignation means that the Conservatives now have the chance to hold all three seats
here for the first time in ten years.  Sawston forms part of a two-seat county division with Great and Little Shelford to the north, which was comfortably held by the Conservatives in May's Cambridgeshire county elections.

There is no Independent candidate to step into Hatton's shoes so her seat is up for grabs.  The Conservatives have nominated the village cobbler and parish councillor Kevin Cuffley.  Labour and the Liberal Democrats have both picked candidates who stood in Sawston in the county elections in May: respectively Mike Nettleton (from Great Shelford) and Michael Kilpatrick (from Whittlesford).  The ballot paper is completed by UKIP candidate Elizabeth Smith, from Duxford.

I am grateful to Keith Edkins' website for the 1998 and 2000 results in the factfile.

Parliamentary constituency: South Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire county council division: Sawston
ONS Travel to Work Area: Cambridge

Kevin Cuffley (C)
Michael Kilpatrick (LD)
Mike Nettleton (Lab)
Elizabeth Smith (UKIP)

May 2012 result Ind 535 C 505 Lab 335 LD 66
May 2011 result C 1397 Lab 767
May 2010 result C 2167 Lab 1304
May 2008 result Ind 747 C 709
May 2007 result C 995 LD 256 Lab 224
May 2006 result C 862 Lab 690 Grn 278
June 2004 result Ind 913 C 900/588/530 Lab 613 LD 530
May 2003 result Ind 482 C 458 Lab 398
May 2002 result C 892 Lab 609
May 2000 result C 615 Lab 363 LD 222
May 1999 result C elected (votes not available)
May 1998 result C 640 Lab 571

[Serenity Now]

Indeed.

At the same time, many Councillors, Green Party members, and the local Green MP Caroline Lucas, actively and publicly supported the striking workers, and it is a alleged that some Green Councillors attempted to oust their leader (Cllr Jason Kitcat).  This fed into the wide public perception that the local Green administration, and broader membership locally, were somewhat divided.

Definitely not the kind of conversation you should have in any written form whatsoever.

[ObserverIE]

South Cambridgeshire, Sawston

Con 46.8 (+11.8)
UKIP 22.9 (+22.9)
Lab 19.5 (-3.7)
Lib Dem 10.8 (+6.2)

Flintshire, Connah's Quay Golftyn

Lab 54.8 (-5.0)
Ind 40.4 (+0.2)
Con 4.8 (+4.8)

Con gain Sawston from Ind