In the one directly elected mayoral by-election held on 15th October we took the post from an Independent. There were twelve principal council by-elections, the Tories held eight seats, Labour one seat and the Liberal Democrats one seat. The Lib Dems took one seat off Labour but this was reversed with Labour taking one seat from the Lib Dems. There were two Parish and Town council election results reported to ALDC   an Independent hold and a Lib Dem gain from Independent. 

The mayoral campaign was gripping everyone in the ALDC as news seeped out of the count all Friday. We fancied our chances from the start. One of our best results in the country on June 4th was in Bedford where, on new boundaries, we became the largest party in the new unitary authority. Then the Tories decided to hold  an open selection for their candidate alienating many of their core voters and activists in the process. We ran a good campaign with big guns like Nick Clegg and Simon Hughes visiting. On the Tory side Eric Pickles and David Cameron were wheeled out. They must have been aghast to see our window posters, stakeboards and super boards dominating across urban Bedford. With Watford, East of England region now has two directly elected Lib Dem, t Mayors lets hope Henry Vann can take the parliamentary seat next May! 

The Cannock Chase Heath Hayes East and Wimblebury Ward in Staffordshire has been held by all three parties over the last 20 years.  Having held it before we won it back in 2004, but lost it in 2008 coming third.  As soon as this election was over we got wind that the Lab councillor was moving to Sardinia and so we started working it.  In the end it took him 18 months to go and even then it was just three days before he would be disqualified.  We also used the county council elections as a trial run for the by-election, just working that part of the division.
Since June we delivered seven leaflets, covered the whole ward in street letters on specific local issues, direct mail and phone canvassed.  In the postal vote we were neck and neck but we won on the day with a phone knock up.

In the Crawley Borough Council Northgate Ward By-election the Tories started their campaign with a leaflet implying that the reason for our councillors resignation was dubious. Coupled with a family bereavement for the candidate this put us on the back foot and we never really recovered dropping from first to third. The local agent suggests that we simply did not knock on enough doors.

There were eight principal council by-elections held on 10th September. Labour held one seat and took one off the Greens. The Lib Dems, Tories and Independents each held two seats.  In the one Parish and Town council election reported to ALDC the Tories won the seat. 

In the Cheadle and Gatley by-election for Stockport council we were particularly keen to win, not just as a fitting tribute to ex-Council Leader Brian Millard who’s untimely death instigated the election, not just because it lies within the Mark Hunters Cheadle parliamentary constituency but also because we lost one of the three seats in 2008 by 17 votes.  As you’d expect in a parliamentary target this campaign had all the bells and whistles but was none the less satisfying, particularly squeezing Labour down to 2.9%.  This is the second by-election in the new Cheadle constituency this year  - the other was Stepping Hill, formerly Maggie Clay’s seat. The two unfortunate but successful elections have allowed us to gather good recent data for about a third of the constituency, which the Tories are targeting, in the run up to next years General Election

In the Market Harborough Welland Ward of Harborough District Council we lost the county seat in June by eight votes. So when one of our district councillors moved and resigned we were glad to hold the seat. Labour failed to stand a candidate so we used both our historic data and Mosaic to identify and squeeze the Labour vote successfully.

In the York City Council ward of Heworth all four major parties fought hard in the seat, which is contained within the York Central constituency. Key to the improvement in the Lib Dem vote was a door-to-door survey preceding the canvass of all households, which picked up over 1,200 pieces of casework, and lots of new deliverers. In a previously unworked Ward we doubled our share of the vote and moving up from fifth into second place collecting deliverers along the way. York have set themselves realistic targets using the by-election to break new territory.
 

There were four principal council by-elections held on Thursday 20th August. The Liberal Democrats gained two seats from Independents but lost one to the Conservatives. The Tories held one seat In the only parish and Town council elections reported to ALDC the Lib Dems held one seat and lost one seat to the Conservatives.

In the Hucknall Central Ward of Ashfield District council, Nottinghamshire the local Liberal Democrats continue to march onward apace. Following dramatic recent electoral progress they had formed the district council's minority administration following the 2008 elections. Then in May this year a cabal of Labour, Independents and the Tories then conspired to oust the Lib Dem administration re-instating Labour much to the fury of local residents. In June’s County elections the Lib Dems made four gains from Labour and have now stormed to success in this District by-election as well. The Liberal Democrats remain the biggest group on the District Council with 13 seats.

In the Mitcheldean and Drybrook Ward, Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire we had come second in the county elections from June and had seen a possible district by-election coming. This had allowed us to identify a potential candidate early and prioritise the County “Thank You” and surveying for this district ward, culminating in us calling the by-election. Our campaign was not innovative from a national perspective, but was novel locally including strong postal vote, volume of literature, clear messaging, blue letters, direct mail, eve of poll, good mornings and two knock ups. It was also handy that we had the only local candidate.

In the Saxilby ward of West Lindsay council in Lincolnshire we lost the seat to the Tories. Our councillor had become an Independent before she resigned and then fought and wonthe by-election as a Tory. This was a council that we ran in 2006 but lost control of in 2008.

Winning candidate Charlie Stewart (third from left) celebrates winning the All Saints by-election with some of his team.

In the three principle by-elections held on Thursday 30th July 2009 the Conservatives took a seat off the BNP, Labour and the Lib Dems held a seat each.
The Lib Dems held a seat on Cheltenham BC ‘All Saints’ ward after the sad death of long-serving Liberal Democrat Councillor Tina Franklin in May. After a hard fought campaign in which they delivered a constant flow of leaflets and letters, they canvassed over 50% of the ward with the valuable help from outside the constituency. The Conservatives as expected ran a hard campaign, but seemed to get the message wrong by talking about the internal workings of the Council. The result was a good majority of 285 over the Conservatives.

In the Tameside MBC, ‘Denton North East’ ward, Labour held the seat with a slight increase of vote share. The two disappointing points of this result are that we did not stand a candidate even though last time we achieved 18.2% of the votes, and the second was the 13.6% (358 votes) that the BNP achieved.

In the Broxtowe BC, ‘Brinsley’ ward, the Conservatives took the seat with 40.9% of the votes and the BNP came second with 28.3% a drop of 15.7% from when they won the seat last time. The Lib Dems did a full-blown campaign of leaflets, target mailings and a 60% canvass. This ward was targeted by the Tories and even though the Lib Dems did a very good campaign, the Tories had a local candidate who has been a Parish Councillor for 30 years, they out leafleted, out canvassed and did the Postal Vote better than we did, by starting earlier than we did. and using all the messages that we would, but against us, resulting in the Conservatives winning the Postal Vote and the seat, with Lib Dems coming third behind the BNP.

The messages from this week's elections are, start early, target the Postal Vote, talk to as many people as possible and make sure that you set the messages and keep control of the campaign.

Cllr Mark Alcock
mark.alcock@aldc.org
 

Although the Norwich North by-election hogged the political headlines, it was the council by-elections that produced the more interesting, and less predictable, set of political news.

This week’s by-election results got off to an early start, thanks to the holiday plans of Kensington & Chelsea’s Chief Executive creating that rare event – a Wednesday by-election. And what a result to start with! Our victory in Colville Ward, a formerly safe Labour seat which includes the famous Portobello Road, is the culmination of four years of hard work by Carol Caruana and her team. The campaign, ably led by Robin Meltzer, saw monthly Focus leaflets and addressed mailings which concentrated hard on the issues that residents of the area really cared about. This result not only gives us our first ever elected councillor in the borough, but it also upset both Labour and the Conservatives in the process, who both assumed they would win.