Keir Mather won the Selby and Ainsty by-election for Labour with 16,456 votes, a majority of 4,161 over Claire Holmes who came second for the Conservative Party on 12,295. Arnold Warneken for the Greens came third with 1,838 votes. The Labour Party increased their votes by nearly 3,000 on the 2019 general election but the Tory vote collapsed from 33,995.
The smaller parties did not do too well at all. Mike Jordan, for the Yorkshire Party, came fourth with 1,503 votes and Matt Walker, for the LibDems, came sixth on 1,188. The turnout was low with 35,886 people voting, or 44.8% of eligible voters, compared with 56,418 or 71.7% at the 2019 general election.
Elsewhere the Tories clung on to Uxbridge by 495 votes but in Somerton and Frome, Sarah Dyke was elected for the LibDems with 21,187 votes (54.6% of the votes cast).
The full results for Selby and Ainsty are below.
Party Candidate Votes %
Labour Keir Mather 16,456 46
Conservative Claire Holmes 12,295 34.3
Green Arnold Warneken 1,838 5.1
Yorkshire Mike Jordan 1,503 4.2
Reform UK Dave Kent 1,332 3.7
Liberal Democrats Matt Walker 1,188 3.3
Independent Nick Palmer 342 1.0
SDP John Waterstone 314 0.9
Monster Raving Loony Sir Archibald Stanton 172 0.5
Heritage Guy Phoenix 162 0.5
Independent Andrew Gray 99 0.3
Independent Tyler Wilson-Kerr 67 0.2
Climate Luke Wellock 39 0.1
Whilst Labour increased their vote significantly, this was small in relation to the collapse of the Conservative vote. The Establishment parties polled 28,751 of the 35,886 votes cast. This represents a very disappointing performance for the smaller parties, even taking into account the first past the post electoral system. It would appear that key messages are simply not getting across. It is also interesting to note that the turnout was low at 44.8%.