Laurence Fox loses his deposit

The London election results have finally been declared and it turns out the poll were not lying: Laurence Fox is not to be the capital’s mayor. The onetime actor lost his £10,000 deposit last night after managing just 47,364 votes or, as he preferred to call it, ‘a football stadium’s worth of voters.’ This was despite boasts of a £5 million war chest, the benefit of having been an ITV star for years and reams of publicity in the national press.

In fairness to Fox he was not alone in this feat; other than Labour, the Tories and the Greens every other mayoral candidate lost their deposit last night. For the third time running the Lib Dems came fourth with 4.4 per cent followed by YouTube prankster Niko Omilana on 2 per cent, Fox in sixth and Brian Rose, a man twice filmed on camera drinking his own urine, on 1.2 per cent.

Rose, who boasted that he spent more than £1 million on his campaign, got just 31,111 votes, meaning each cost him at least £32. Count Binface meanwhile took 1 per cent followed by Jeremy Corbyn’s even more eccentric brother Piers on 0.8 per cent and UKIP’s aptly named Peter Gammons on 0.6 per cent.

Sadiq Khan was of course re-elected as mayor but on just 55.2 per cent of second preference votes, a lower than expected total. After a mammoth 951 thankless days on the campaign trail, sometimes polling more than 20 points behind Khan, Tory Shaun Bailey did better than expected, beating 2016 candidate Zac Goldsmith’s results and taking 44.8 per cent of second preferences.

So what now for Fox and his Reclaim party? Mr S understands it is not yet the end of politics for the former Lewis star, with further stunts and announcements expected in the near future. Steerpike wishes the best of luck to Fox going forward in building on his platform and doing for the rest of Britain what he has done for London.