Well done Lucy Salek, Lib Dem candidate in the Lewisham East by-election yesterday. And well done to the team around her for delivering a very creditable 19% swing from Labour and a comfortable increase in actual and share of the vote. The result is as follows (and I've included all the candidates due to the novel situation in which there are nearly as many of them as there are electors!):
Janet Daby (Lab) 11,033 (50.20%, -17.75%)
Lucy Salek (LD) 5,404 (24.59%, +20.17%)
Ross Archer (C) 3,161 (14.38%, -8.62%)
Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah (Green) 788 (3.59%, +1.88%)
Mandu Reid (Women) 506 (2.30%)
David Kurten (UKIP) 380 (1.73%, +0.04%)
Anne Marie Waters (FBM) 266 (1.21%)
Maureen Martin (CPA) 168 (0.76%, +0.28%)
Howling Laud Hope (Loony) 93 (0.42%)
Massimo DiMambro (DVP) 67 (0.30%)
Sean Finch (Libertarian) 38 (0.17%)
Charles Carey (ND) 37 (0.17%)
Patrick Gray (Radical) 20 (0.09%)
Thomas Hall (YPP) 18 (0.08%)
Lab maj 5,629 (25.61%)
18.96% swing Lab to LD
Electorate 66,140; turnout 21,979 (33.23%, -36.05%)
It is usual for the main opposition to be the beneficiary of any swing in a midterm by-election. While it is hard for a party on 68% to improve on their share of the vote in a particular constituency, an 18% drop is noteworthy. With the Conservatives widely acknowledged as making a mess of Brexit, the economy suffering a withering dose of flu and Tory MPs revolting, Corbyn should be romping ahead. He is not even moving forward. Polls are giving the Tories a slight edge when typically the main opposition should be leading by a significant margin at this stage. Clearly something is going wrong for Labour.
No doubt the Corbynistas will blame a BBC conspiracy against the proletariat or a Murdoch campaign to brainwash the "working class" for Labour's lacklustre performance. At some point however, Labour are going to have to wake up to the fact they have a waste of space as leader.
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