This morning’s news headlines called it a “surprise landslide victory”. That’s shorthand for commentators being caught off guard and not accurately capturing the mood of the “safe Labour” Bradford West electorate who turned out in force (turnout just over 50%) to return George Galloway to Parliament in the by-election. Results via the BBC:
- Candidate (Party), vote (vote share, change since 2010)
- George Galloway (Respect) 18,341 (55.89%, +52.83%)
- Imran Hussain (Lab) 8,201 (24.99%, -20.36%)
- Jackie Whiteley (C) 2,746 (8.37%, -22.78%)
- Jeanette Sunderland (LD) 1,505 (4.59%, -7.08%)
- Sonja McNally (UKIP) 1,085 (3.31%, +1.31%)
- Dawud Islam (Green) 481 (1.47%, -0.85%)
- Neil Craig (D Nats) 344 (1.05%)
- Howling Laud Hope (Loony) 111 (0.34%)
With the London Mayoral election just around the corner – in which the Green Party recently announced they’d recommend their voters transferred to Ken Livingstone as the lesser of two evils – Labour will need to respond quickly to avoid the anti-Labour sentiment spreading any further.
If only Vincent Hanna had been around to report on the by-election build-up and reports! As he once reported on Blackadder:Newsnight
At the Election Polls
(announcer, Vincent Hanna, speaks)H: Good evening and welcome to the Dunny-on-the-Wold bye-election. The first thing I must tell you is that the turnout has been very good. As a matter of fact, the voter turned out before breakfast. And I can bring you the result of our exculsive exit poll, which produced a 100-percent result for “Mind-Your-Own-Business-You-Nosy-Bastard.”
(a voice shouts out): Mr. Hanna, are you going to talk to any of the candidates?
H: I certainly am, and I can see Prince George, who is leader of what has become known as the `Adder Party’; Prince George, who is described in his party news sheet as a “great moral and spiritual leader of the nation,” but is described by almost everyone else as a “fat, flatulent git.” (to George) Prince George, hello.
Alan Meban. Tweets as @alaninbelfast. Blogs about cinema and theatre over at Alan in Belfast. A freelancer who writes about, reports from, live-tweets and live-streams civic, academic and political events and conferences. He delivers social media training/coaching; produces podcasts and radio programmes; is a FactCheckNI director; a member of Ofcom’s Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland; and a member of the Corrymeela Community.