MATT Western has narrowly held onto the Warwick & Leamington seat for Labour.
Mr Western was defending a slim 1,206 majority after winning the seat from Conservative Chris White at the 2017 election. That was reduced to 789.
On a bad night for his party, the former Warwickshire county councillor polled 23,718 votes , followed by Conservative candidate Jack Rankin who polled 22,929, Liberal Democrat Louis Adam with 4,995 votes, Jonathan Chilvers for the Green Party with1,536, Brexit Party candidate Tim Griffiths with 807, Independent Bob Dhillon with 153, and Social Democratic Party candidate Xander Bennett with 67.
Turnout was 71 per cent.
Mr Western said: “It is a huge honour to be re-elected for Warwick and Leamington, it is an area I am hugely passionate for and I thank those who voted for me, and all those who voted. Our democracy is such a precious thing and we must protect that.
“I would like to thank all the team. We had an extraordinary team who helped me get re-elected.
“I also wish to thank the other candidates for the contest and sharing the time with them.”
The result was a lot more straight forward in Kenilworth and Southam where Jeremy Wright comfortably held onto the seat for the Tories.
The member of former prime minister Theresa May’s cabinet was defending an 18,000 plus majority, which increased to over 20,000.
Mr Wright polled 30,351 votes, followed by Liberal Democrat Richard Dickson with 9,998, Labour’s Antony Tucker who polled 9,440, the Green Party’s Alison Firth with 2,351 and Monster Raving Loony Party candidate Nicholas Green with 457.
Turnout was 77.2
Mr Wright said: “I want to thank my campaign team for their remarkable support.
“I want to thank all the candidates I have shared the campaign trail with. I think we can be justly proud we can maintain a standard of discussion that it is for the most part honest respectful and enables people of the constituency to see the arguments clearly, and I like to think that it something we will see more of in politics in future.
“Politics I believe has become too fractious, argumentative and hostile and it is time to move past that. I hope the picture not just in this constituency but nationally too shows the constituency wants us to move past that and work better together in future.
“I want to say thank you to my wife and children for not only putting up with this process again but all the support they give me.”
