World of Chig   

6.5.05
Respect is due

Wow! I'm now living in a marginal constituency! Roger Godsiff had the 6th safest Labour seat until today, with a majority of 16,246. Tonight, that has been slashed to 3,289 by Respect. That means the Labour majority has dropped from 44.3% to 8.6%. Respect's Salma Yaqoob has pushed the LibDems, a distant second in 2001, down to third. Turnout here is up slightly, to 51.8% from 49.3% in 2001.

If only we had known just who the closest challenger was. The combined vote of Respect and the LibDems would have booted Godsiff out, but that was always the problem. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Labour achieved their parliamentary majority at 4.28am. It's now 5.30am and I'm going to bed. 595 results are declared so far, with 51 to come.
The standings so far are:
Lab 343
Con 184 (Already up 18 on their 2001 total.)
LibDem 56 (Already up 4 on 2001, with more to come - their best result since 1923. Hurrah!)
Others 12 (including Kidderminster Hospital Health Concern retaining Wyre Forest, George Galloway (Respect) taking Bethnal Green & Bow and an Independent Labour candidate knocking the stuffing out of Labour in Blenau Gwent.)

This has been a very unusual way to start a birthday. Goodnight!


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