East Anglia byelection news

Greens on the rise in byelections across the East

In September there were byelections for five Local Authority seats in East Anglia.  The Greens took two seats from Conservatives, but the Conservatives recovered two seats (from an Independent and a Liberal Democrat) and held the fifth.  These results probably reflect local circumstances, and in three cases the turnout was very low.

Broadland

In Broadland (Norfolk) there were three Conservative held seats vacant, both bordering Norwich, where Labour is in power, with the Greens in opposition. There are no Conservative Councillors in Norwich.

In the Brundall Ward the Conservatives lost two seats to the Greens. The Green vote share rose from 21 percent to 36 percent. The Liberal Democrats stood for the first time. Conservatives and Labour both saw a large fall in vote share. The turnout here was relatively high at 32 percent.

In the Old Catton Ward the Conservative held the seat with 50 percent of the vote. There was a 3 percent swing from Con to Lab. The turnout was 22 percent.

West Suffolk

There was a byelection in The Rows, a ward with a very unusual population for rural Suffolk because most employment in the ward is on the huge Mildenhall USAF base.

It had been held by an Independent with a very clear majority. This time there was no Independent candidate and the Conservative candidate (Parliamentary Agent for the local MP, Matt Hancock) won comfortably. The turnout was very low at 18 percent.

East Cambridgeshire

In the Soham Ward, the Conservatives took back the seat which they lost to the Liberal Democrats in 2019. The turnout was very low at 19 percent.