A GREEN Party candidate whose opponent was suspended by Reform UK has won a Winterbourne Parish Council by-election.
Monica Maggs was elected to represent the council’s Winterbourne ward with 998 votes to Paul Heyward’s 663.
Mr Heyward was suspended by Reform UK, which announced it had withdrawn its support for his candidacy after the Greens complained over “inflammatory messages” on a now-deleted social media account.
Turnout at yesterday’s by-election was 29%, about 6% below the turnout for the elections to the whole parish council in 2023.
A total of 1,661 votes were cast from an electorate of 5,790, with 21 voters spoiling their ballot papers.
Frampton Cotterell result
In neighbouring Frampton Cotterell’s West ward, Liberal Democrats Kate Andrews and Jon Lean were elected with 509 and 500 votes respectively, ahead of Reform UK’s Tom Harris, who received 173 votes.
Two seats on the council were up for election, with each voter given two votes: a total of 1,182 were cast, with only 1 ballot spoiled.
The turnout of around 41% from an electorate of 1,688 was only 2% below the figure for 2023’s South Gloucestershire Council elections in Frampton Cotterell.
That year there were no parish council elections for Frampton Cotterell, as only 14 people were nominated for the parish’s 15 seats.
Vacancies on parish councils in the middle of the four-year electoral cycle, which runs until next year, are often either left empty or filled by a vote of existing councillors, a process known as co-option, if a volunteer can be found.
However in the past six months there have been seven contested elections in parishes across South Gloucestershire, all of which have involved Reform UK candidates.
By-elections can be held if they are requested by two or more voters living in a ward.
In another by-election held in South Gloucestershire yesterday, Labour won two seats on Filton Town Council’s Conygre ward.
The party’s candidates Mac Elmorssy and Andy Mills polled 399 and 402 votes respectively, while Reform UK’s Christopher Lee and Rama Narayanasetty received 273 and 248 votes respectively, on a turnout of 26%.