Political

Four contests kick off 2018-19 cycle of council by-elections

The 2018-19 cycle of council by-elections has kicked off this week with four seats to fill across three wards: two Labour defences, one Conservative defence and one Green defence. And a full slate of Lib Dem candidates, hooray.

Skerton West, Lancaster

A Labour defence in a ward without a Lib Dem candidate in 2015 but with a presence for the party in the September 2017 council by-election here.

University and Scotforth Rural, Lancaster

The ward where someone managed to get elected with less than 100 votes in December 2016 thanks to a precipitous drop in student participation. There are two Liberal Democrat candidates this time. That’s good news rather than unfortunate chaos as there are two seats up for election. One of those is a Labour seat and the other is a seat vacated by someone elected as a Green but who subsequently joined Labour.

Leiston, Suffolk Coastal

A Conservative defence with a Liberal Democrat candidate, and another Lib Dem vote increase:

These by-election results round-ups cover principal authority by-elections. See my post The danger in celebrating parish and town council wins for your own party for the reasons to avoid straying too often into covering town, parish or community council by-elections.

2 responses to “Four contests kick off 2018-19 cycle of council by-elections”

  1. It’s certainly encouraging to see that all 4 council by-election seats were contested by the Lib Dems (I note the Greens failed to put up a candidate in the Suffolk Coastal seat, despite having done so previously) and that we did make some modest progress, doubling our vote in Suffolk Coastal, and getting respectable showings in both the Lancaster seats. Well done, Lancaster Lib Dems and Suffolk Coastal Lib Dems !

  2. The Greens appear to continue to perform poorly. with their vote share falling in both the Lancaster Wards, and losing their seat in the University & Scotforth Rural Ward, while they failed to contest the Suffolk Coastal Ward, having done so previously.

    With the wipe-out of UKIP in the local elections, and only very modest progress by the Greens, from a very low base in those elections, it would be nice to think that we are now back to clearly being the Third Party of British politics.

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