RESULTS FROM OLD BEXLEY & SIDCUP BY-ELECTION ON THE 2ND DECEMBER 2021

THE RESULTS FROM OLD BEXLEY & SIDCUP BY-ELECTION ON THE 2^ND DECEMBER 2021

 

This was a By-election in which there were two Party Leaders taking part and also the reputation of the Conservative Party Government was at stake. 

 

The recently deceased MP, James Brokenshire, was someone, who (like many Conservative MPs) was selected by his Party and elected on the basis that he was a Eurosceptic.  Once elected he proved in fact to be a Remainer who became a May loyalist and he actively worked to undermine the EU Referendum result. 

 

He was also like most Conservative MPs carrying on mass immigration whilst dishonestly maintaining that they are trying to do something about it!

 

There was therefore plenty of good reason for Conservative voters to refuse to turnout to vote for the Conservative Party and for his replacement, Louie French, who seems to be cut from very much the same cloth. 

 

There was also the dismal performance of Labour nationally and Kier Starmer, in particular, who is a lacklustre Leader.  Labour’s full-on support for Refugees Welcome and all the Multi-Culturalist agenda has now largely got through to even the least engaged White Working Class voter!

 

Many LibDem voters also have given up on their former Party on the basis that they actively sought to betray the democratic vote of the country to Leave the EU.

 

There were therefore very good reasons why the vote in this By-election would be suppressed. 

 

Sure enough if we look at the results which I set out here there was a massive drop in turnout and a drop in the votes of those parties that stood in the election last time. 

 

                                                                      Votes in                 Votes in

                                                                      2021                      2019

 

34% turnout           69.8% turnout

 

Conservatives                                                11,189                   29,786

Labour                                                           6,711                     10,834

Richard Tice - Reform UK                             1,432                    

Greens                                                           830                        1,477

Lib Dem                                                        647                        3,822

Elaine Cheeseman - English Democrats     271

UKIP                                                             184

Rejoin EU                                                      151

David Kurten – Heritage                                116

Christian Peoples Alliance                             108

MRL                                                             94

 

No drop in turnout greater though than the Conservative drop.  Their candidate was elected on First Past The Post but he got only slightly over a third of the votes that they got last time in 2019 and only about 17% of the electorate voted for him.

 

What of the two Party Leader candidates?  David Kurten and his newly created Heritage Party only got a dismal 116 votes, despite an active campaign and a full leaflet drop using the Royal Mail free leaflet drop facility which is available for parliamentary candidates.  His result for a Party Leader in an area close to his home gives pause for thought as to whether it is worth standing in any further elections for them (particularly with such a non-descript Party title!).

                                                                                                            

There was also Richard Tice of the re-badged Brexit Party, now calling itself the meaningless and Leftist sounding name of Reform UK.  He had a light blue rosette but very deep pockets.  From what I could see it looks likely that he spent the maximum spending allowance in a By-election of £100,000.  He had a fully paid and quite a large team of perhaps twenty odd leafleters and canvassers and lots of leaflets, including a 20 page plus booklet, but still only managed 1,432 votes! 

 

Given the amount of money that must be in the bank account following the company when it was called the Brexit Party taking £17.5m during the last EU election, I would expect them to turn up regularly at By-elections and not make any headway, despite massive spending. 

 

With Elaine Cheeseman, standing for the English Democrats, we had an excellent candidate, who, if elected, could have done a very good job as an MP. 

 

We did however suffer from problems with our normal printer who let us down.  We were then rushing to catch up and, although Royal Mail did a reasonable job, we probably only got leaflets distributed to a third of the constituency. 

 

Nevertheless the result we got for a really very small spend of just over £1,000 is, I think, credible and certainly shows that if we had got all our leaflets delivered and were able to equal the leafleting efforts of Richard Tice and Co we would probably have beaten him easily.

 

The other Right of Centre contender was UKIP, who got 184 votes, despite having a full leaflet drop, demonstrating again that they are electorally over!

 

Our next By-election would seem to be likely in Southend West which can now be called at any time. 

 

We want to do well in that election, which we may well be able to do, given that the other “Mainstream” parties have announced that they are not standing, as has Richard Tice’s, UK Reform Party.  This will give us a good opportunity which would be a shame to miss.  Please do help us raise enough money to do a good job.