2011 Election Results

Previously: Roger Matthews (LibDem), Margaret Flaherty (LibDem).

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Previously: the same three.

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Previously: Ron Flaherty (LibDem), Robert Bright (LibDem), Ken Hando (LibDem).

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Previously: Gabrielle Davis (Con), Gillian Reuby (Con), Ann Taylor (Con).

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Previously: Peter Lee (Con), Vince McMahan (Con).
Click for full results across the District.

Runners and riders

Here are the candidates for Herne Bay for the local elections.

Walk the walk

In about 6 months' time, there will be a flurry of democracy as we all choose our councillors. We might choose the old councillors; we might choose new councillors; we might choose you! Next week, CCC will be explaining how to be a councillor. I'm intrigued.

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Ever thought you could run the council better? [Just about every time I think of it!] Now there is a chance to find out. Canterbury City Council is holding an open evening for would-be councillors at the Guildhall, Canterbury, on Tuesday, November 30th. The event kicks off at 6.30pm and could appeal to anyone thinking of standing as a candidate in the local elections in May, or those involved with parish councils and voluntary organisations.

Speakers will include the city council's chief executive, Colin Carmichael, and councillors who will offer an insight into the work involved. The evening will consist of brief presentations followed by a question-and-answer session.

Anyone who wants to attend should e-mail democraticservices@canterbury.gov.uk, indicating whether they are a prospective candidate or a member of an interested group. If the event is oversubscribed, priority will be given to prospective candidates. There will be a separate session for parish council elections and candidates.

For more details, call democratic services officer Nicola Adams on 01227 862005.

thisiskent

General Election results

Here's how you voted. See how it compares with my forecast...

click it to big it

Post-election: stress, disorder

In contrast to the hard mathematical precision of my recent results analysis, today I go out on a limb for a national prediction. The LibDems will collect more votes and more seats than ever, but not as many seats as the number of votes would imply (as usual). What will thrill them to bits, however, will be the wildly disproportionate influence that they will wield as the maker/breaker of kings and coalitions. 

Unaccustomed as they are to the exercise of power, their initial efforts may appear gauche, attracting criticism and derision. They will be completely unbothered by anyone who tries to rain on their parade. In their shoes, I would push for electoral reform being the primary and absolute pre-condition for any form of alliance, and get the legislation passed asap.

After a while the wheels will fall off, and everything will go pear-shaped, the new friends will fall to bickering, and we will be stuck with stalemate and stagnation. Eventually, the penny will drop and whoever is running the show will realise that the only resolution will be to call an election.

Hah! Now it gets interesting. With the new electoral system (whatever it is, some degree of proportional representation or transferable voting) smaller parties will get more of a look-in on a purely mathematical basis. More importantly, people's voting patterns will almost certainly change. Even under the current system, about 10% of votes are cast for parties that have absolutely no chance whatsoever of winning. Within a new electoral framework that allocates seats and power in proportion to actual votes, many more people will vote for the smaller parties.

We may find ourselves living in a truly multi-party democracy.

Daft General Election Forecast!

Behold my far-fetched but statistically sound election result forecast. You will by now have heard and seen any number of polls and analyses, confidently "predicting" Thursday's outcome. I expect you are all worldly-wise enough to realise they are a load of tosh. Weary call centre slaves heckle the unsuspecting few by phone, and smug pundits recklessly extrapolate the results to several decimal places of precision. Knowing that you will be unsatisfied with such piffle, I have assembled the most reliable prediction yet - read it if you dare...

Rather than relying on a precarious forecast drawn from a few thousand (possibly imaginary) people across the whole country, this forecast is based on the entire turnout in the North Thanet constituency from the last 6 general elections, some 285,00 people in all. With such a large sample, predictions can be made with a much higher level of confidence.

Starting with the universally recognised statistical technique of drawing a straight line that touches NONE of the data points, we can be assured that the turnout on Thursday will be 43,300.

We can now repeat the exercise with each of the main party's percentage share of the vote. (One of the lines does come perilously close to a data point - I do apologise.)

So, the results will be as follows:

Conservative: 19,139 (44.2%)

Labour: 16,367 (37.8%)

LibDem: 5,153 (11.9%)

Given the sample size, this forecast can be relied on to be about 100 times more statistically significant than any other you have seen. The margin of error is about as wide as the page.

Vote on Thursday, or hang your head in shame.

General Election Results

See the results going back to 1983...

2005
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Roger Gale	21,699	49.6	-0.7
	Labour	Iris Johnston	14,065	32.2	-2.2
	Liberal Democrat	Mark Barnard	6,279	14.4	+3.4
	UKIP	Timothy Stocks	1,689	3.9	+1.6
Majority			7,634	17.5
Turnout			43,732	60.1	1.1
	Conservative hold		Swing	+0.8

2001
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Roger Gale	21,050	50.3	+6.2
	Labour	James Stewart Laing	14,400	34.4	-4.0
	Liberal Democrat	Seth Proctor	4,603	11.0	-0.4
	UKIP	John Moore	980	2.3	+1.4
	Independent (politician)	David Shortt	440	1.1	N/A
	National Front	Thomas Holmes	395	0.9	N/A
Majority			6,650	15.9
Turnout			41,868	59.0	-9.9
	Conservative hold		Swing

1997
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Roger Gale	21,586	44.1
	Labour	Iris Johnston	18,820	38.4
	Liberal Democrat	Paul Kendrick	5,576	11.4
	Referendum Party	M Chambers	2,535	5.2
	UKIP	J E Haines	438	1.1
Majority			2,766	5.7
Turnout			48,955	68.8
	Conservative hold		Swing

1992
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Roger Gale	30,867	57.2
	Labour	A M Bretman	12,657	23.46
	Liberal Democrat	J L Phillips	9,563	17.72
	Green	H F Dawe	873	1.62
Majority			18,210	33.75
Turnout			53,960	76.02
	Conservative hold		Swing

1987
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Roger Gale	29,225	58.03
	SDP-Liberal Alliance	N R M Cranston	11,745	23.32
	Labour	A M Bretman	8,395	16.67
	Green	D R Condor	996	1.98
Majority			17,480	34.71
Turnout			50,361	72.23
	Conservative hold		Swing

1983
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Roger Gale	26,801	58.44
	SDP-Liberal Alliance	W MacMillan	12,256	26.72
	Labour	Cherie Booth	6,482	14.13
	BNP	B Dobing	324	0.71
Majority			14,051	32.37
Turnout			45,863	70.02
	Conservative hold		Swing