Wiltshire’s Tory heartland turns multi-coloured

A county that had a Conservative MP for every seat became multi-coloured.

Called a Tory heartland, Wiltshire has been a Tory stronghold.

But now Labor MPs have taken two seats, while the Liberal Democrats now have three.

The first Conservative defeat of the evening came in Swindon South, where former Justice Secretary Robert Buckland, who had held the seat since 2010, was defeated by Labour’s Heidi Alexander.

She won with 21,676 votes, while Sir Robert came second with 12,070.

Thanking the residents in his speech, Sir Robert said “our political system itself is at a crossroads”.

“I’m a Swindon girl born and bred and I can tell you this, I’m on a mission, a mission to restore pride and opportunity,” she added.

For Swindon North, Conservative Justin Tomlinson was also ousted by Labour’s Will Stone, with Mr Tomlinson, a former disability minister, saying it had been a “terrible night” for his party.

In Melksham and Devizes, former Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Michelle Donelan was defeated by Liberal Democrat Brian Mathew, who celebrated his victory with his dog Heidi.

The newly formed constituency included part of Ms Donelan’s old seat of Chippenham.

After the result was declared at Trowbridge County Hall, Ms Donelan left for the car park, where members of her team objected to the cameras filming her departure.

Chippenham also switched from Tory blue to Lib Dem yellow, with Sarah Gibson telling the BBC she was “delighted” to be the person chosen for the job.

She won the seat with 22,552 votes, with Conservative candidate Nic Puntis coming second with 14,414.

She told BBC Radio Wiltshire she was “thrilled” to be able to support those in the constituency who live in “pockets of deprivation”.

South Cotswolds, which had one of the highest turnouts in the country, was taken by Liberal Democrat Roz Savage.

Ms Savage defeated Tory James Gray, who had been Tory MP for North Wiltshire since 1997 and was the candidate for the newly formed seat of South Cotswolds.

The new seat, which takes up almost half of the old Cotswold constituency – including Cirencester and its environs such as Lechlade, Fairford and Tetbury.

It also includes Kingswood near Wotton-under-Edge (not to be confused with the Bristol district of the same name) and many parts of North Wiltshire such as Malmesbury, Cricklade, Castle Combe and Minety.

There were also some successes for the Tories, with both Andrew Murrison retaining his seat for South West Wiltshire and John Glen retaining his position in Salisbury.

As Andrew Murrison, who has represented the area since 2001, celebrated his victory, he admitted the evening did not go that way for many of his party colleagues across the country.

“I have seen a large number of colleagues and close friends lose their seats – they will be a great loss to their constituents,” he told the BBC.

A close colleague of former premier Rishi Sunak, Salisbury MP John Glen said he was “absolutely delighted” to be re-elected, especially after the “toughest campaign” he had fought.

His majority of nearly 20,000 in 2019 has been reduced to just under 4,000, blaming his party’s fate on party gate and the failures of the Liz Truss era.

In East Wiltshire, Tory Danny Kruger claimed victory but was not shy about commenting on his party’s difficulties in the polls.

He told the BBC: “It’s really clear that we’ve just lost this election because millions of voters left us to vote for Reform. There is no other possible explanation.

“We should have taken some different decisions, especially with our migration policy.

“Too many people have felt, in my view, fairly, that we have not addressed the challenge of illegal and legal migration.”