It turns out Kemi Badenoch’s kitchen sink approach in the recent Barnet by-election paid off. The result of the Hendon ward council by-election came in early this morning, with the poll held after former Tory councillor Joshua Conway lost his seat over a job change making him ineligible to stay on. But as Mr S wrote on Tuesday, the Conservative campaign was rather unusual – in the fact that a number of rather senior politicians took the trouble to canvass for their candidate. It’s not all that common for a party leader, a shadow justice secretary and the party’s chairman to take much interest in a council poll – but given how the Tories are polling at present, every seat counts.
Not only did the party bus in swathes of activists, Tory chairman Kevin Hollinrake, shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick and even party leader Kemi Badenoch have all traipsed around Barnet on the campaign trail – quite something for a local by-election in a Tory safe seat. While there were six candidates in the running, the contest was widely viewed as being a two-horse race between the Conservatives and Reform. Thanks to the resource piled into the campaign, the Tories came out on top – winning 46.8 per cent of the vote, which is 2.5 percentage points down on their 2022 result. The Reform candidate – who didn’t appear to get much help from his party leadership – came in second winning a not unimpressive 30.2 per cent of the vote, although not quite enough to secure the seat.
It’s a good result for the Conservatives – but Badenoch has her work cut out if she is to replicate this level of focus ahead of the Scottish, Welsh and local elections next year…
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