Martin Cullip drew 41 votes in Sutton & Cheam, where the Lib Dems won out over the Conservatives by 22,156 votes to 20,548. No doubt people were disinclined to "throw a vote away" in such a close-run seat.
Nic Coome drew 141 votes in Devizes, where the Conservatives beat the Lib Dems by 25,519 votes to 12,514.
Perhaps LPUK should target safe Labour seats instead. Are there any libertarians in Scotland?
As I was in the process of writing this post, Guthrum posted to the LPUK blog with his thoughts on the result in Devizes:
This picture sums up why the Libertarian Party stood in Devizes yesterday. A BBC interviewer asking sensible questions about what is Libertarianism, and a Libertarian answering.
The imperceptible squeak in a seat where noblesse oblige rules the local Tory Party (I have not seen characters like this since watching the last ever episode of ‘To The Manor Born’) allowed 141 voters to vote for something that they have never heard of before Nic Coome stood, let alone had the opportunity to vote for.
The Greens have just won their first seat, they have spent twenty five years losing deposits- you need to have realistic expectations. I had zero expectations of these two seats so I am not disappointed.
ReplyDeleteMany more people now know of our existance, and 237 people across the country actually voted for us as a leap of faith.
Fair point. Perhaps I was overly optimistic. I assumed the libertarian message would be very well received after 13 years of New Labour.
ReplyDeleteI didn't expect victory, but I hoped LPUK would beat the various random independents, and possibly also the Greens and UKIP.
You are right that it takes a while to get established. In our case, it also takes a time for people to adjust to our views, which can seem very harsh at first.
Hopefully this campaign will have planted the seed in many more minds.