Local Council by-election 25th April

[Tony Otim]

And the final one before May's elections:

SHROPSHIRE UA; Belle Vue (Lab resigned)
Candidates:
GEORGE, Ross Christopher (Conservative)
HALLIDAY, Mary Kate (Labour)
LATHAM, Dave (Green)
MCLEOD, James (Liberal Democrat)
OAKLEY, Bob (UKIP)

2017: Lab 643; LD 423; Con 362; Grn 67
2013: Lab 939; Con 289
2009: Lab 797; Con 571; Grn 161; LD 117

The Green stood here in 2017.

Current Council: Con 48, LD 12, Lab 6+1vacancy, Ind 6 (4 Independents +2 non-affiliated Independents), Grn 1

[tonygreaves]

This may be more than usually interesting.

Strong LD campaign. Gain?
Climate change top of the agenda. Green boost?
Will UKIP get a Farage/Brexit boost in a perverse sort of way?

[timmullen1]

Andrew’s Preview for your delectation: britainelects.com/2019/04/24/preview-25-apr-2019/

[andrea]

[Davıd Boothroyd]

Lab 47.1
L Dem 31.5
C 11.9
GP 5.1
UKIP 4.5

[Deleted]

Better than expected. Terrible for the tories

[polaris]

Apr 25, 2019 23:00:55 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Better than expected. Terrible for the tories

Labour are around the same level - in percentage terms and raw votes - as the 2017 local elections, in which they were hammered across the country. That's not very auspicious for next week. There should be some gains from the Tories by default, but only because their vote is staying at home or going to Ukip.

[Deleted]

Apr 25, 2019 23:08:18 GMT polaris said:

Apr 25, 2019 23:00:55 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Better than expected. Terrible for the tories

Labour are around the same level - in percentage terms and raw votes - as the 2017 local elections, in which they were hammered across the country. That's not very auspicious for next week. There should be some gains from the Tories by default, but only because their vote is staying at home or going to Ukip.

though this is their first by election this year where they've increased their vote on 2017

[middleenglander]

Shropshire, Belle Vue - Labour hold

Party	2019 votes	2019 share	since 2017	since 2015 B	since 2013	since 2009
Labour	603	47.1%	+4.1%	-0.7%	-29.4%	-1.3%
Liberal Democrat	403	31.5%	+3.2%	+10.5%	from nowhere	+24.4%
Conservative	152	11.9%	-12.3%	-12.8%	-11.7%	-22.8%
Green	65	5.1%	+0.6%	-1.5%	from nowhere	-4.7%
UKIP	58	4.5%	from nowhere	from nowhere	from nowhere	from nowhere
Total votes	1,281		87%	112%	104%	78%

Swing Liberal Democrat to Labour ~ ½% since 2017 but Labour to Liberal Democrat ~ 5½% since 2015 by-election.

Council now 48 Conservative, 12 Liberal Democrat, 7 Labour, 4 Independent *, 2 Non-aligned **, 1 Green
* 1 elected Health Concern, ** 1 elected Conservative, 1 Labour

[andrew111]

Apr 25, 2019 23:08:18 GMT polaris said:

Apr 25, 2019 23:00:55 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Better than expected. Terrible for the tories

Labour are around the same level - in percentage terms and raw votes - as the 2017 local elections, in which they were hammered across the country. That's not very auspicious for next week. There should be some gains from the Tories by default, but only because their vote is staying at home or going to Ukip.

I think extrapolating from one local by-election to local elections all over Britain is probably a tad dangerous! But if you want to do it then the Tory vote plummeting by over 50% is certainly not very auspicious for them!

[Sibboleth]

Hysterically bad result for the Tories, but not really surprisingly so: the LibDems will have put the tactical squeeze on and the national circumstances are what they are. Solid result for Labour, who chose the right sort of candidate (well known local resident etc) for a ward that does take note of these things. LibDems might feel they should have done better, but they've demonstrated that their return to apparent relevance in the ward isn't a flash in the pan. I remain a bit surprised that the Greens have given up (obvious before the results just from their choice of candidate) because this is somewhere with potential, but I suppose they'd rather secure Porthill before considering expansion.

[matureleft]

One by-election of course tells us little but it’s perhaps fair to say that, in this case, the Brexit fiasco failed to benefit an explicitly hard Leave party that was available as a protest option and made little difference to an explicitly Remain party. Shock. People actually seem largely to have treated it as a local election!

[finsobruce]

Apr 26, 2019 5:32:36 GMT matureleft said:

One by-election of course tells us little but it’s perhaps fair to say that, in this case, the Brexit fiasco failed to benefit an explicitly hard Leave party that was available as a protest option and made little difference to an explicitly Remain party. Shock. People actually seem largely to have treated it as a local election!

What on earth were they thinking off???!

[yellowperil]

Apr 26, 2019 5:32:36 GMT matureleft said:

One by-election of course tells us little but it’s perhaps fair to say that, in this case, the Brexit fiasco failed to benefit an explicitly hard Leave party that was available as a protest option and made little difference to an explicitly Remain party. Shock. People actually seem largely to have treated it as a local election!

The Tory performance, or lack of it,  though can probably be explained  by factors that aren't just local?

If as I understand  the area was somewhat remain- inclined and left of centre politically, the result makes quite a lot of sense, except maybe the Lib Dem result was just a bit disappointing, but that was probably down  to the suitability and quality of the Labour candidate and campaign. In this case they got it right, it seems, but if they had messed that up it would have been very open.

[Adam in Stroud]

Apr 26, 2019 5:32:36 GMT matureleft said:

One by-election of course tells us little but it’s perhaps fair to say that, in this case, the Brexit fiasco failed to benefit an explicitly hard Leave party that was available as a protest option and made little difference to an explicitly Remain party. Shock. People actually seem largely to have treated it as a local election!

Things may have changed due to the recent chaos, but a couple of months back the feedback from those areas in Glos which have local elections in May was that Brexit was not really an issue on the doorstep; and furthermore that canvassing for the locals didn't necessarily reflect GE patterns e.g. in Cotswolds we were pushed into 3rd by Labour in the last GE but were/are a strong second in locals.

The obvious conclusion is that voters are quite capable of spotting that a council in Shropshire won't decide Brexit. Given the low turn-out in locals it wouldn't be surprising if the electorate is better informed about politics than average. The bigger issue IMO is of activists and voters who are usually tribally loyal getting sufficiently pissed off to sit on their hands.

[carlton43]

Apr 25, 2019 23:21:21 GMT Sibboleth said:

Hysterically bad result for the Tories, but not really surprisingly so: the LibDems will have put the tactical squeeze on and the national circumstances are what they are. Solid result for Labour, who chose the right sort of candidate (well known local resident etc) for a ward that does take note of these things. LibDems might feel they should have done better, but they've demonstrated that their return to apparent relevance in the ward isn't a flash in the pan. I remain a bit surprised that the Greens have given up (obvious before the results just from their choice of candidate) because this is somewhere with potential, but I suppose they'd rather secure Porthill before considering expansion.

Not really.  perceived to be a two-horse race this time the squeeze goes on the vote of other candidates.  The Conservatives are not just in deep mid-term blues but the political slough of utter despond. In such circumstances the vote held up better than I expected. Just one seat.Not a heavy poll. Look at 2013 when matters were considerably better.

[Pete Whitehead]

Any seat that Labour won in 2009 ought to be a complete banker, but IIRC there were some surprisingly good performances in Shrewsbury then which are probably best explained by personal votes

[The Bishop]

Apr 25, 2019 23:08:18 GMT polaris said:

Apr 25, 2019 23:00:55 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Better than expected. Terrible for the tories

Labour are around the same level - in percentage terms and raw votes - as the 2017 local elections, in which they were hammered across the country. That's not very auspicious for next week. There should be some gains from the Tories by default, but only because their vote is staying at home or going to Ukip.

Our byelection results this year generally haven't been anything to write home about, so this one was quite pleasing considering the effort put in by the LibDems.

[tonygreaves]

I am a bit disappointed by this result. Not a good omen for the Tories though. But as people say, one Council by-election is not even a swallow.

[Sibboleth]

Apr 26, 2019 9:20:46 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Any seat that Labour won in 2009 ought to be a complete banker, but IIRC there were some surprisingly good performances in Shrewsbury then which are probably best explained by personal votes

There was a curious mix of surprisingly good and embarrassingly bad performances in Shrewsbury that year; e.g. Sundorne (historically and now once again extremely solid) was somehow lost. Though the candidate being on a cruise for the bulk of the campaign was perhaps less than beneficial there.