The village I live in, Pembury, near Tunbridge Wells, was a LibDem marginal ward. No longer. We thrashed the yellow peril today.
Con 1124
Lib 877
50% turnout
Last time the LibDems were 50 votes ahead, so it's a massive swing to us. The LibDem councillor, Tom Symondson, is 23. He's the youngest councillor in the South East. He was actually rather good so to beat him by that margin is a real triumph for the Conservative Mike Tompsett. I knew they were in trouble when I saw them driving round the village in a Mercedes open top car with a megaphone. Very environmentally friendly I don't think! Well done Mike!
UPDATE: We won another LibDem seat in St Johns, Tunbridhge Wells. LibDems lost two of the four seats they had councillors in.
12 comments:
Iain modestly omits mentioning his contribution in canvassing for this victory during the last few weeks. Thanks Iain!
5 off Labour in Tamworth out of ten seats up for re-election, Con Hold.
Well done. On to North Norfolk!
Jeremy Vine looks like he could actually make a good replacement for Peter Snow, very surprised....but why on earth does Sarah Teather have be the BBC's Lib Dem of choice, she is appalling.
Oh dear...Dimbelby, "David Blunkett at his local count in Sheffield there...just WATCHING what is going on"!
I'm so glad. My sister has lived in the UK for eight years now, and always in Tory areas. Thank God she has never had to put up with Labour incompetence and corruption. Long live to the Conservative Party!
44 people currently on your website Iain - is this a record?
Peter from Putney
No, not a record, I saw 75 earlier today!
Whilst we all await some interesting election results, can we please have the offical Dale Predictions for tomorrow's reshuffle?
Ha ha! Antonio, nice joke!
(By the way, in case it wasn't a joke, your sister came here just after the Labour government was elected. Local politics here are very unimportant compared to many other countries, so living in a Tory area makes very little difference to her living conditions. Which obviously aren't so bad as she's chosen to stay all that time. Or to put it another way, most of the politics that have affected her have been the politics of the national government, which has been Labour for all the time she's been here.)
Not joking. I lived in Lambeth for a few years, and I can definitely tell the difference between my area and hers (Woking-Guilford). Complete neglection, complaciency and waste in Lambeth, quite the opposite in Woking, not to mention the horrible racial quotas which help no one -"are you black?" I was asked once, as if my race would guarantee access to public services.
I should stop reading The Spectator, or else I will take the first BA flight out of this corner of Eurabia and propose to Matthew Parris. This is indeed a joke.
Antonio, I wasn't saying there are no differences between areas but, as a rule, local politics follows from local conditions, not the other way round. Local councils have very little say in how much money they can raise and what they can spend it on. Of course, some are better at it than others, but that doesn't always follow party lines.
My main point was that it is amusing that you could think that living a Tory local area during the time of a Labour government (or vice versa), would prevent you from having to "put up with" the incompetence or corruption of the party in government. A secondary thought was your apparent belief that Tory politicians are never incompetent or corrupt. Perhaps you remember Shirley Porter?
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