Bath
2015 Result:
Conservative: 17833 (37.8%)
Labour: 6216 (13.2%)
Lib Dem: 14000 (29.7%)
Green: 5634 (11.9%)
UKIP: 2922 (6.2%)
Independent: 499 (1.1%)
Others: 63 (0.1%)
MAJORITY: 3833 (8.1%)
Category: Marginal Conservative seat
Geography: South West, Avon. Part of the Bath and North East Somerset council area.
Main population centres: Bath.
Profile: A compact seat drawn tightly around the city of Bath itself and entirely surrounded by the North East Somerset constituency. Bath is an elegant and attractive Georgian spa town, tourism is important to the economy, but there are also strong software and service industries and two univerisities - the University of Bath and Bath Spa University.
Politics: Bath was historically a Conservative seat but was famously lost to the Liberal Democrats in 1992 when Chris Patten, the then Chairman of the party, won the general election but lost his own seat. It was regained by the Conservatives in 2015.
| Con: | 14768 (31%) |
| Lab: | 3251 (7%) |
| LDem: | 26651 (57%) |
| GRN: | 1120 (2%) |
| Oth: | 1296 (3%) |
| MAJ: | 11883 (25%) |
| Con: | 15463 (34%) |
| Lab: | 6773 (15%) |
| LDem: | 20101 (44%) |
| GRN: | 2494 (5%) |
| Oth: | 1005 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 4638 (10%) |
| Con: | 13478 (29%) |
| Lab: | 7269 (16%) |
| LDem: | 23372 (50%) |
| GRN: | 1469 (3%) |
| Oth: | 708 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 9894 (21%) |
| Con: | 16850 (31%) |
| Lab: | 8828 (16%) |
| LDem: | 26169 (48%) |
| Oth: | 950 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 9319 (17%) |
*There were boundary changes after 2005
She can’t have been that bad after re-gaining the seat comfortably, after accepting a hospital pass, when the original candidate dropped out late on.
I can’t get too upset about the defeat of a Tory but Howlett seemed like one of the better ones, his loss is certainly a blow to the prospect of PR and I think its fair to say given his social liberalism he wouldn’t have stood for the Tories doing a deal with the DUP
Howlett has been on the radio supporting the DUP deal saying it might improve LGBT rights in Northern Ireland.
Bm11
Well that’s certainly an “interesting” take on it. If he genuinely believes that then my estimation with him has dropped significantly. The Tories need the DUP to form a gov, the Tories therefore are going to be in no position to make demands on LGBT rights in NI, in fact I wouldn’t be at all surprised if one of the DUP demands is some sort of constitutional amendment that outright bans any Westminster based gov enforcing such rights on NI in the future.
Surely Howlett’s loss isn’t a great dent to the prospect of PR given he’s been replaced by a Liberal Democrat who is surely just as pro-PR?
Total Dynamic
The point was he was the lone voice in the PCP that was totally in favour of PR. At best other Tory MP’s are ambivalent, most are totally against.
”I can’t get too upset about the defeat of a Tory but Howlett seemed like one of the better ones”
Well he had several personal problems which probably damaged him with the electorate to some extent.
Certain concrete things like the existence of the All Party Parliamentary Group for PR are now in doubt in terms of being able to exist thanks.
Basically with Carswell stepping down, Howlett defeated, and Hannan denied the opportunity to be selected, there are no right of centre voices for PR in Parliament.