Liberal Democrats gain Solihull and Birmingham Yardley and hold Hereford

12.01.00pm BST (GMT +0100) Sat 7th May 2005

Liberal Democrats gain Solihull and Birmingham Yardley and hold Hereford

The Liberal Democrats gained two seats in Thursday's General Election - Lorely Burt in Solihull and John Hemming in Birmingham Yardley as well as holding Paul Keetch in Hereford. I spent a lot of time in the campaign helping in Solihull and have previously worked in Hereford so was especially pleased with those results.

In Solihull, Lorely Burt and the Liberal Democrats recorded a 10.0% swing from the Conservatives to take the seat with a 279 vote majority. The full result was:

Lorely Burt - Liberal Democrat - 20,896 votes, 39.9% +13.9%

John Taylor - Conservative - 20,617 votes, 39.4%. -6.0%

Rory Vaughan - Labour - 8,058 votes, 15.4% -10.2%

Diane Carr - British National Party - 1,752 votes, 3.3% +3.3%

Andy Moore - UK Independence Party - 990 votes, 1.9% -0.3%

Majority - 279 votes, 0.5%

Turnout - 52,313 votes, 83.1% +19.8%

In Birmingham Yardley, John Hemming and the Liberal Democrats recorded a 8.8% swing from the Labour to take the seat with a 2,672 vote majority. The full result was:

John Hemming - Liberal Democrat - 13,648 votes, 46.4% +8.1%

Jayne Innes - Labour - 10,976 votes, 37.3% -9.6%

Paul Uppal - Conservative - 2,970 votes, 10.1% -3.0%

Robert Purcell - British National Party - 1,523 votes, 5.2% +5.2%

Mohammed Yaqub - UK Independence Party - 314 votes, 1.1% +0.0

Majority - 2,672 votes, 9.1%

Turnout - 29,431 votes, 57.7% +0.5%

In Hereford, Paul Keetch and the Liberal Democrats held on despite a massive Conservative attempt to unseat him, there was just a swing of 0.1% to the Conservatives. The full result was:

Paul Keetch - Liberal Democrat - 20,285 votes, 43.3% +2.4%

Virginia Taylor - Conservative - 19,323 votes, 41.2% +2.5%

Tom Calver - Labour - 4,800 votes, 10.2% -4.9%

Brian Lunt - Green - 1,052 votes, 2.2% -0.4%

Christopher Kingsley - UK Independence Party - 1,030 votes, 2.2% -0.5%

Peter Morton - Independent - 404 votes, 0.9% +0.9%

Majority - 962 votes, 2.1%

Turnout - 46,894 votes, 65.3% +0.1%

The Liberal Democrats also moved ahead in Birmingham Hodge Hill and in Shrewsbury and Atcham, the two other seats I was working in. Both these seats will be considered winnable next time.

Sadly in Ludlow, Matthew Green and the Liberal Democrats could not hold off the Conservative challenge and the Conservatives won the seat. The Liberal Democrats did however move forward in virtually all the West Midlands seats and look set to gain more seats at the next General Election.