Hats off to the Conservative Party for trying to involve more people in politics with their full postal ballot in Totnes to select a candidate to take on Lib Dem challenger Julian Brazil at the next election.
And congratulations to Dr Sara Wollason who won the ballot with nearly half the votes case.
Poor old Nick Bye, 3,088 votes (less than 20% of those cast) and mostly I suspect from people hoping that if they voted for him he would have to resign as Mayor of Torbay!
The Tories didn’t have to do it this way. They could have simply restricted votes to members, or to anyone who could turn up to a hustings meeting. Instead they spent an estimated £40k on a full postal ballot of 69,000 people within the boundaries of the new Totnes constituency. As an aside I wonder if they might have to select again if there is a by-election before the General Election on the existing boundaries given several thousand Totnes constituents were not sent ballot papers? Unless Anthony Steen MP was minded to resign I hope this doesn’t happen.
I do not share the cynical view that this was a desperate exercise to draw a line under the embarrassing circumstances of Anthony Steen’s decision not to stand again at the next election. I hope the Tories will repeat the exercise in future selection to prove the cynics wrong.
Sadly, I can’t see my party ever having the funds to engage in such an exercise. Unlike the Tories we don’t have super rich tax exile donors to help us out financially.
The result: Sarah Wollaston 7914 (48%) Sara Randall-Johnson 5495 (33.3%) Nick Bye 3088 (18.7%) Turnout 24%
Looks like Torbay is left with a lame duck Mayor who wants to be somewhere else.
Recent Comments