Local election results go against national trends
Labour retains a healthy hold on South Tyneside District Council after yesterday’s local government elections, however, the loss of four seats to the Independent Alliance makes that hold rather tenuous if the party’s national fortunes continue to nosedive with Prime Minister Brown at the helm. The prospect of an election in two years time which might see the arrival of a Conservative government will surely worry local Labour activists, if a general election were to be held either on the same days as, or close to local government elections, they could easily lose the four seats that they need to retain control. Four seats going from Labour to Independent would spell the end of Labour’s long hold on power in South Tyneside.
The writing has been on the wall for the past two years, but somehow Labour has managed to buck the national trend here, it’s share of the vote has not slipped down to the 25% mark seen around the rest of the country and they are fortunate that there is no real organised campaign from the Conservatives to worry them, the Tories in South Tyneside also buck the national trend by failing to get anywhere near the vote share enjoyed in the rest of the country. No, Labour’s troubles are coming from those no longer welcomed within their ranks, the South Tyneside Independent Alliance boasts a number of former Labour Party members and two former Labour councillors returned to the Chamber last night under a new banner.
The share of the vote in South Tyneside was as follows;
- Labour 37.27%
- Independent Alliance 22.85%
- Conservative 15.91%
- BNP 9.19%
- Progressive 5.78%
- Lib-Dem 5.01%
- Real Independent 2.33%
- Green Party 1.39%
45000 people voted out of an electorate of 114,236 so turnout was just a little higher than expected, but we are faced with the vagaries of the first past the post system which sees Labour form the majority ruling party when 63% of people voted against a Labour candidate, and in terms of how many of the total electorate bothered to come out and support the Labour Party, they were elected by only 14.69% of the electorate!
Don’t jump up and down and get too excited by that figure because the other parties attracted even less support of the whole electorate!
I have to express serious disappointment with our local Conservative Party in South Shields and Jarrow, the level of support is clearly commensurate with the level of campaigning and canvassing, as I’m sure the other parties are aware. It appears as though candidates were found to give electors a good choice at the polling stations, but other than in a few selected wards active campaigning seems to have been negligible and expenditure close to zero! If they want to be seen as a serious choice in local politics then they need to do much better than this, try taking a leaf out of the Independents book, I don’t care for their total lack of meaningful policies but they have grasped the concept of fighting elections!
Seats are won over the long haul with lots of voter involvement on the ground over the period of many many months, Mr. Ahmed Khan is a perfect example of this tenacity and determination, John Hodgson too has put in the leg work as had Steve Pattison who came so close to winning. If the Conservative Party has any intention of making a mark as the Progressive vote dissipates then they need to put in two years of hard graft on the streets to have any chance at all.
The cause of the Independents has been greatly helped by local conditions and voter antipathy towards plans for a new hotel at the Gypsies Green site in South Shields and a perceived lack of communication with the voters from the ruling Labour group, the large turnout in the areas of Westoe Crown Village and the area behind the Bamburgh and the New Crown public houses bears testimony to this, Gordon Finch’s election has no doubt been achieved on the back of this effective protest.
So why have the Labour and Conservative share of the votes gone against the national trends? Could it be that a moderate Labour group enacting post Blairite modernisation policies have effectively stolen the Tory party clothes? Could it be that Conservative voters are plainly out there (just look at Whitburn and Marsden) but nobody bothered to go looking for them?
South Tyneside Election Results.xls
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