The recent general election saw a good result for the Liberal Democrats in both Southampton seats. In Southampton Itchen the Liberal Democrat vote increased from 6195 to 9162 an increase of nearly 50%. Overall Liberal Democrat the share of the vote increased by 6.2% while Labour’s vote decreased by 6.2%. This increase in support was even above the national average increase in Liberal Democrat support of 3.8% and far exceeded the 1.7% increase for the south east of England.
The conservative vote share in Southampton Itchen decreased again for the second general election in a row this time by 0.5%. By contrast this was the second general election in a row that the Liberal Democrat vote increased; it was up 3.3% in 2001 and 6.2% this time.
Across the country the Liberal Democrats were the only main party to make gains in all parts of the country. No other party has the geographical spread or the balanced representation between city, urban, suburban and rural seats that the liberal Democrats now have. This was a good election result Liberal Democrats for many other reasons :-
In contrast this is a result is bad for the Conservatives
And finally for Labour well losing 100 seats from your majority is hardly a ringing endorsement of 8 years of government.