As you will have read elsewhere, the Conservatives comfortably won the by-election in Totteridge last week. Not The Barnet Times congratulates Alison Cornelius on her election to the council.
However, the shine will have been taken of her victory by a closer analysis of the result below which shows a marginal, but very significant, swing to Labour of 0.01%. The reason this is significant is because everywhere else in the country, the Labour vote collapsed.
Nobody seriously expected the Conservatives to lose a seat in their safest ward, but given the anti Labour mood in the country, it is quite remarkable that their vote held up here.This by-election was caused by the resignation of Caroline Margo who has moved to Hertsmere with her young family. She stood for election last week in Watling and had a stunning victory with over 71% of the vote. In her new ward, the Labour vote completely disintegrated, as you would expect.
The Totteridge result is certain to be investigated by the Conservative leadership. If Labour’s vote can hold up in a ward where they had absolutely no hope of winning, Party managers will want to know the reason, as they will clearly be worried for the General Election.
Not The Barnet Times suggests that a quick glance through the archives of this blog will reveal why Mike Freer is the only Conservative Council leader to see a swing to Labour this week.
5 comments:
You must get over your issues with Mike Freer... it has gone from the pathetic to the desperate!
How is analysis of voting figures a 'vendetta against Freer'? You'll next be accusing David Dimbleby or Peter Kellner of 'having it in for Brown'! You are very touchy, is something weighing on your mind?
Don't worry about the comments from these two. It's an interesting article so keep up the good work! If people aren't interested it surprises me that they would leave comments.
The famous Chipping Barnet Election machine is dead - this result is truly remarkable for Labour. And yet all the local tories can do, is refer to the blog master as pathetic to the desperate. Maybe it is Chipping Barnet Tories who are desperate, when they cannot even win well in a seat which is suppose to be rock solid.
Something has gone wrong in Chipping Barnet for this to happen - will we be told ?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/davehillblog/2009/jun/08/not-the-barnet-times-totteridge-byelection
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