Cardiff South and Penarth by-election

The result for the Cardiff South and Penarth by-election,

Cardiff South and Penarth by-election, 15 November 2012
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour Co-op	Stephen Doughty	9,193	47.3	+8.4
	Conservative	Craig Williams	3,859	19.9	-8.4
	Liberal Democrat	Bablin Molik	2,103	10.8	-11.5
	Plaid Cymru	Luke Nicholas	1,854	9.5	+5.3
	UKIP	Simon Zeigler	1,179	6.1	+3.5
	Green	Anthony Slaughter	800	4.1	+2.9
	Socialist Labour	Andrew Jordan	235	1.2	N/A
	Communist	Robert Griffiths	213	1.1	+0.7
Turnout			19,436	25.7%	-38.2
	Labour Co-op hold		Swing	8.41% swing C to Lab

Lab maj 5,334 (27.44%)

General Election 2010: Cardiff South and Penarth[16][17]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour Co-op	Alun Michael	17,262	38.9	-7.7
	Conservative	Simon Hoare	12,553	28.3	+4.4
	Liberal Democrat	Dominic Hannigan	9,875	22.3	+2.4
	Plaid Cymru	Farida Aslam	1,851	4.2	-1.1
	UKIP	Simon Zeigler	1,145	2.6	+1.2
	Independent	George Burke	648	1.5	+1.5
	Green	Matthew Townsend	554	1.2	-0.6
	Christian	Clive Bate	285	0.6	+0.6
	Communist	Robert Griffiths	196	0.4	+0.4
Majority			4,709	10.6
Turnout			44,369	60.2	+2.0
	Labour Co-op hold		Swing	-6.0

Alas my prediction was off mainly because I over estimated the Plaid vote and under estimated the others 

Labour – 51%

Conservative – 22%

Plaid – 13%

Lib Dem – 6%

UKIP – 6%

Others -4%

Though Plaid can take some comfort in being the only major party to increase their vote in a low turnout although the Greens saw the biggest increase number wise.. 

The Libdems can be relieved to retain third place but three years ago they would have probably expected to win a by-election in a constituency such as Cardiff South and Penarth and the future looks bleak for the Cardiff Central seat which thy currently hold.


Gareth Hughes in his preview of the seat  referred to  Stephan Doughty the now Labour MP as being 

 "straight from central casting for Labour.  Young, male, on message and from the third sector. In his case boss of Oxfam Cymru.

To which I posted the comment

"More like Central Cloning".