A fantastic result! Well done team!
Results:
LDs 12, Con 11:
LibDems:
Victoria 4
Northcroft 4
Pyle Hill 2
Clay Hill 1
St Johns 1
Conservatives:
Falkland 4
Clay Hill 3
Brummel 1
St Johns 3
There were recounts at St Johns (the third Tory seat was won by them by just 3 votes) and in Northcroft.
Liberal Democrats 12 seats, Conservatives 11 seats. So LibDems retain control.
LibDems won: Victoria 4, Northcroft 4, Pyle Hill 2, St Johns 1, Clay Hill 1
Conservatives: Falkland 4, Clay Hill 3, St Johns 1, Brummel 1
Recounts happened for the St Johns and Northcroft wards.
The seat numbers for the parties are unchanged. Two seats changed hands. Brummel Grove went from LD to Con. 1 seat in St John’s, previously Con, was won by the LDs. The LibDems came within three votes of winning a second seat in St Johns. A Conservative candidate was four votes behind the fourth LibDem winner in Northcroft.
Official results are here on the NTC website.
Are available here .
4 Tory gains. 1 LibDem gain. New balance: Tories 39, LibDems 13.
Five seats have changed hands – Thatcham South x 2 and North x 2 seats to Con gain. The LibDems gained a seat from the Tories in Thatcham Central.
The result details are posted here on West Berkshire Council’s website.
Mark Thompson has written an excellent and frank summary of the AV campaigns. Two points:
1. I was extremely frustrated that the Yes campaign didn’t send out a flyer to all households by Royal Mail (as the No campaign did) explaining AV. And what the hell happened to the Electoral Commission pamphlet to every house explaining AV – both sides of the argument? During the Common Market referendum during the 70s, the government sent out a pamphlet to every home giving both sides of the argument.
2. This has strengthened me in the view that reform needs to be done through Parliament. Referenda do have their place, but they do depend on brisk rebuttals from both sides.
I think we may be ignoring one element. I think the Yes campaign did rebut the lies of the No campaign. But I think the negativity of the No campaign perhaps struck a chord which found a welcoming home with the reactionary strand of thought in the British public – especially among Labour voters. When push comes to shove, there is a large portion of the British public who are against change and will latch onto any nonsense to avoid it, even when that nonsense is clearly rebutted.
In other words, although Liberals will find it difficult to believe, the British public by a margin, actually just didn’t like AV and prefer FPTP.”Keep a-hold of Nurse; For fear of finding something worse”- Hillaire Belloc.I know this is heresy to say in Liberal circles, but I think we need to accept that is possible.
By the way, I saw some idiot saying STV would have done better. I don’t think so. We would have got ourselves tied up in knots trying to explain that even more. The Irish seem to love STV, but I think there is a big rump (particularly amonsgt older votes) in the UK that just don’t like change. It’s lamentable, I know, but there it is. We have to respect that.
The press are having a go at the LibDems for making big losses in large cities in the north of England, and comparing us to the Tories, the Tories didn’t have anywhere to lose in those cities.
So any anti-government vote there has been absorbed by the Liberal Democrats.
Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield, Hull (and probably Newcastle later) are taking it in the neck, but down south we’ve mainly held up.
Liberal Burblings 