By-Election Night Live: 30th July (Inverclyde)

We are LiveBlogging again tonight and it should be a litte bit more succesful than last week as I'm at home! *Touch wood* We shouldn't have any internet issues so tune in for up to the minute rumours and results from all of tonight's by-elections from 10.30pm.

By-Election Preview (30th June)

In addition to the Inverclyde by-election there are only two local Council by-elections taking place today. They are in Broxbourne (Hertfordshire) and Wandsworth (London) and the Conservatives are the defending party in both of them. Unfortunately both vacant seats are in safe wards on safe Councils so we'll be relying on the Westminster by-election to provide the entertainment this week.

I'll start in Broxbourne where the reason for the vacancy is interesting. The sitting Conservative Councillor Jason Brimson was arrested for fraud and subsequently resigned from his seat in the Cheshunt Central ward. The matter relates to Brimson's company which provides insurance for businesses. He easily won his seat in 2010 with just under 65% of the vote and as the Conservatives held this ward with similar vote shares in 2008 and 2011 it's safe to say they are unlikely to lose this, despite Brimson's actions.

A few extra candidates are standing in this by-election compared to previous elections in Cheshunt Central which could have an affect on the result. The Independent candidate Joanne Welch is a former Tory Councillor who defected last winter and subsequently lost her Cheshunt North seat this May when she sought re-election. She may draw votes from the Conservatives in this contest but as she came a very poor third in her own ward last month it's hard to see her preventing a Tory hold today. In any case, the Conservatives have a large majority on the Council so they can cope with an upset.

Chesthunt Central (Broxbourne)
By-Election Candidate	2011	2010	2008
Tony Siracusa (Con)	67.9%	64.8%	66.8%
Richard Greenhill (Lab)	20.4%	23.4%	16.8%
N/C (ED)	11.6%	-	-
N/C (BNP)	-	11.8%	16.4%
Peter Huse (LD)	-	-	-
David Platt (UKIP)	-	-	-
Joanne Welch (Ind)	-	-	-

The other by-election today is in a slightly less safe Conservative ward and is also taking place following a resignation. Following the untimely death of the London Mayor's Chief of Staff, the highly valued Simon Milton, Wandsworth's Council leader Edward Lister was named as his replacement. Whilst Lister goes on to bigger and better things (he has just received a knighthood!) his constituents in the Thamesfield ward have a by-election to look forward to.

The contest has managed to make a bizarre splash in the blogosphere following LabourList's 'exposé' on a Liberal Democrat leaflet. Their complaint was that Lisa Smart didn't draw that much attention the fact she was a Lib Dem and speculated as to why that might be. The article drew a peculiar rant from the Labour campaign manager in the by-election complaining that LabourList hadn't made enough effort to promote his candidate's campaign.

Back to the leaflet itself, the attack on the 'secret Lib Dem' would be a tad more justified if either the Liberal Democrats had any chance of winning or the Labour candidate in this by-election wasn't doing exactly the same thing! Christian Klapp appears to be working this ward hard and has delivered a number of leaflets during this campaign. They include not one but two leaflets with which you would be hard pressed to realise Klapp was a Labour candidate.

With Labour and the Lib Dems battling it out to see who can come up with the best way to keep their candidate's party label hidden the Conservatives must be quietly pleased. This should be a straightforward hold for the Tories, who have a large majority on the Council anyway.

Thamesfield (Wandsworth)
By-Election Candidate	2010
Mike Ryder (Con)	56%
Christian Klapp (Lab)	17.7%
Lisa Smart (LD)	16.8%
Marian Hoffman (Grn)	9.6%

Tom Harris

Debates provide talking points in Inverclyde By-Election

After the Statement of Persons Nominated was released for the Inverclyde by-election for those watching from a far news on the contest has been scarce. The general assumption on our part was that the SNP were struggling to make any ground on Labour and the by-election was a foregone conclusion. However, a couple of debates scheduled late in the campaign appear to have changed things a little.

Exactly a week before polls closed STV's Politics Now programme aired a debate with four of the five candidates (UKIP were excluded). The event was sure to be a banana skin for Labour candidate Iain McKenzie who, all things being equal, should have been cruising to victory. Unfortunately for Labour he didn't exactly cover himself in glory as and, as others have pointed out, gifted the young Liberal Democrat candidate Sophie Bridger an amusing put down when he consistently talked over her (see from around 17 minutes).

The SNP are in the best position to take advantage of any slip ups from Labour in this by-election but their candidate Anne McLaughlin feels she has scored a major victory in this campaign. The issue revolves around a leaked document that the SNP claim defines the criteria for Inverclyde Council to make compulsory redundancies. The SNP candidate pushed McKenzie, the leader of Inverclyde Council, on the issue during the first debate but he avoided explicitly ruling out compulsory redundancies.

It was in a second debate on the Politics Show (44 mins) that McLoughlin brought up the issue again and the Labour candidate stated that there will be no compulsory redundancies and there were no plans for any in the first place. Both sides have been spinning this locally and with job creation such a big issue in this by-election this is sure to have played a role in the final week.

What is striking from the debates is how much the other candidates managed to wind up McKenzie. He was cautioned by the chairs for interrupting and certainly didn't give off the aura of a candidate confident of victory on Thursday. Annoyingly this is first by-election of the Parliament that has not been polled so knowing exactly where everyone stands in this contest is difficult. Besides, any fieldwork for a poll would have been conducted at the end of last week so the fallout from the two debates would not have been captured.

Given the lack of media attention on this by-election before last Thursday it's safe to assume Labour were heading for an easy victory and although the SNP are fighting hard in the final few days I don't think it will be enough. McKenzie should hold this for his party, but I expect his majority to be a lot smaller than the 14,416 David Cairns racked up last May.

By-Election Candidate	2010
Iain McKenzie (Lab)	56 %
Anne McLaughlin (SNP)	17.5%
Sophie Bridger (LD)	13.3%
David Wilson (Con)	12%
Mitch Sorbie (UKIP)	1.2%

Tom Harris

By-Election Watch (27/06/11)

Here are this week's changes to the by-election page:

Council	Type	Ward	Defending Party	Reason	Date
Torfaen	Wales	Snatchwood	Independent	Death	26th July
Blackburn with Darwen	Unitary	Beardwood with Lammack	Conservative	Health	28th July
Enfield	London	Bush Hill	Conservative	Resigned	28th July
Perth & Kinross	Scotland	Highland	SNP	Resigned	TBA
Windsor & Maidenhead	Unitary	Eton & Castle	Conservative	Resigned	TBA

After last week's bumper by-election night our page was looking a bit bare but fear not, a few vacancies have become known and July is shaping up to be another eventful month. Thirteen are currently scheduled with July 7^th (5) and July 28^th (4, and counting) being the busiest nights. This week there are just two local by-elections, which will provide a nice under card for the Westminster by-election in Inverclyde. We'll have coverage on all three elections throughout the week.

Tom Harris

Nationalists gain in Scotland and Wales

The Scottish and the Welsh Nationalist parties both celebrated gains in local by-elections this week. In Scotland the SNP took another seat off the Liberal Democrats in Aberdeen, which has had a huge impact locally, and Plaid Cymru scored a narrow victory in Carmarthenshire.

We'll start in Scotland where the Aberdeen by-election on Thursday saw the SNP storm to yet another victory. They took the seat after eight rounds of counting, although they also managed to top the first preference vote after an 18.5% swing from the Lib Dems on first preferences. The Tory vote also fell back and perhaps the biggest surprise was a large rise in the Labour share of the first preferences.

The Lib Dems polled very poorly for a ward where two of the three councillors were Lib Dem in 2007 - losing more than half of their votes and falling from first to fourth in terms of first preferences. Their Scottish collapse seems to be continuing unabated to the benefit of the SNP, but has probably been particularly exacerbated in this case by the nature of the previous councillor's resignation in disgraced circumstances. The SNP meanwhile gain their first ever seat in this ward, bringing them closer to the prospect of majority control in Aberdeen after next year's local elections.

The Labour rise was unexpected and must also give them hope of a seat here next year. The very large size of the Lib Dem vote was probably a likely cause - some former Lib Dems would perhaps be more inclined to switch to Labour, even though most of the swing we have seen across the country has been to the SNP, and with so many votes to play for making advances must have been relatively easy. The Conservatives will also be disappointed with their vote falling when they also hold a seat in this ward. This might be down to the effect of Tory plans to increase taxes in the oil sector, which is threatening jobs in areas like this.

Of the other candidates, the Greens came fifth on first preferences but were eliminated in 6th place after a couple of early transfers favoured the independent Bennett. One also has to wonder precisely what was on the mind of the two voters who gave their first preference to the National Front and then their second vote to the Greens!

The SNP now have a two seat lead over the Lib Dems in Aberdeen and shortly after the result was announced the Lib Dem leader of the council announced he would resign to allow the SNP's Callum McCaig to become council leader. Aged 26, McCaig becomes the youngest council leader anywhere in the UK. Although the formation of the new administration has not yet been made clear, McCaig has indicated he would prefer to maintain a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. KK

		Stage
By-Election Candidate	1stP%	1	2			3			4			5			6			7
Gordon Townson	33.2%	1112	3	12%	1115	5	15%	1120	16	15%	1136	25	20%	1161	102	17%	1263	178	22%	1441
Angela Taylor	23.3%	783	0	0%	783	1	3%	784	26	25%	810	19	16%	829	127	21%	956	112	14%	1068
Bill Berry	19.4%	649	3	12%	652	2	6%	654	2	2%	656	20	16%	676	125	21%	801	-801
Gregor McAbery	16.5%	554	4	16%	558	4	12%	562	22	21%	584	15	12%	599	-599
Richie Brian	3.0%	101	2	8%	103	1	3%	104	-104
Graham Bennett	2.9%	98	1	4%	99	10	29%	109	13	13%	122	-122
Hamish MacKay	1.0%	32	2	8%	34	-34
Dave MacDonald	0.7%	25	-25
Non-Transferable			10	40%	10	11	32%	21	25	24%	46	43	35%	89	245	41%	334	511	64%	845

Aberdeen City Council
SNP		LD		Lab		Con			Abd Con			Ind
15	1	13	-1	10	-	2		-	2		-	1		-
Airyhall/Broomhill/Garthdee
By-Election Candidate							Votes			Vote %			+/-
Gordon Townson (E)							1112			33.2%			+15.8%
Angela Taylor							783			23.3%			+10.5%
Bill Berry							649			19.4%			-8.1%
Gregor McAbery							554			16.5%			-21.1%
Richie Brian							101			3.0%			+3.0%
Graham Bennett							98			2.9%			-1.8%
Hamish MacKay							32			1.0%			+1.0%
Dave MacDonald							25			0.7%			+0.7%

In Llanegwad, Carmarthenshire the poaching of an unaffiliated candidate who had already stood in the division worked for Plaid Cymru as they held off a challenge from an Independent to gain the seat. The by-election was taking place following disqualification of Independent Councillor Dilwyn Williams. He had been granted a leave of absence after being taken ill but after 18 months the Council moved to release the seat.

In 2008 John Charles stood as a candidate with no description and came second behind Williams but he went one better on Thursday. As the Plaid candidate Charles won the seat by 44 votes from the new Independent and he becomes the 31^st member of the Nationalists group on the Council. However, Carmarthenshire is controlled by an Independent led coalition and so Plaid will have to wait until next years full Council elections for their opportunity to win a majority. TH

Carmarthenshire County Council
PC		Ind		Lab			PF		LD			Un
31	+1	28	-1	11	-		2	-	1		-	1	-
Llanegwad
By-Election Candidate						Votes				Vote %
John Charles (E)						494				52.1%
Clive Pugh						455				47.9%