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Results


In Birmingham the political scene looks much the same as it was before. There is still no overal control of the council, so a Conservative - Liberal Democrat coalition will continue to govern. Up the road from me in Sparkbrook the anti-war Respect Party won its first seat in Birmingham. I also heard that the Green Party did pretty well in Bournville.

Most worrying of course is the success of the far right, anti-immigration, racist British National Party. For the first time they put candidates in every ward in Birmingham. The BNP candidate was declared a winner in Kingstanding, but then that result was later decared false, which would mean no BNP candidates won in Birmingham proper.

However, in the greater Birmingham area some BNP candidates did win. In Solihull the BNP candidate in Chelmsley Wood beat the Labour candidate by 20 votes. In Solihull the Conservatives hung on to power, with the Lib Dems gaining by one seat.

In Sandwell the BNP now have 4 councillors. Labour retain overall control.

In my old home town of Walsall Conservatives retained control.

In Redditch Labour lost overall control, there is now no overall control.



Nationally of course it was a terrible night for Labour. Everyone expected this with a third term administration with two weeks of terrible publicity. Conservatives did reasonably well, but not in places like Manchester. Lib Dems seem to be coasting along.
The percentage of the votes seem to be:
Conservative 40%
Liberal Democrats 27%
Labour 26%
Other 7%

I can't find the turn-out but I think it was pretty low.

The Greens have done reasonably well nationally, gaining 18 seats nationally, with more expected.

And the BNP have done well in some areas of London as well.



Blair's done a major reshuffle of the cabinet this morning. Most significant: Charles Clark has been sacked, Jack Straw demoted. Margaret Becket (formally Environment) is now Foreign Secretary (the first woman foreign secretary); John Reid (formally Defense) is now Home Secretary; Alan Johnson (who?) is now Education Secretary.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Arguably the success of a party with Stalinist sympathisers, anti-Semites and homophobes (aka RESPECT) is as equally worrying as the success of every liberal's favourite set of bogeymen - the BNP.
6:26 pm
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