So, the results,

Candidate	Votes
Blumenthall, UKIP	88
Clawley, Green Party	433
Gaston, Respect	156
Howell, Labour	2181
Judges, Conservative	963
Lawrie, BNP	156
Mullaney, Liberal Democrats	2476

That's a LibDem hold, although rather closer than they might have liked. Turn out of 6624 votes cast, a shade over 35%, was just under 1100 down on last year. Bucking the national trend, however, the Labour vote not only held up, it actually increased slightly. The Conservatives were also a shade up. Everyone else was down. The LibDems dropped 250 odd, the Greens 240, and Respect, who were third last year, crashed out losing nearly 800. In the past, I've also felt the Respect campaign literature was pretty nakedly sectarian. They took a rather different line this year, which I was pleased about, and fielded a Christian priest. Obviously it didn't work out for them, and I'll be interested to see what they do next time, assuming Respect can hold it together as a party for that long.

The numbers don't quite add up, with more votes lost than were not cast, so it looks like the LibDems must have have picked up some of those Respect votes. I'm only an amateur psephologist, so that's about the limit of my analysis.

As noted below, the LibDems were, despite my assertion to the contrary, out leafletting. I found this out in a rather roundabout way, because Cllrs Mullaney, Cox, and Hendricks were out on their rounds when they chanced upon Hal-baby, who'd wandered off while Natalie was engaged in Moseley in Bloom conversation. Natalie and Cllr Mullaney often work together on MiB business, the street tree planting programme being a particular case in point, so he knew Hal-baby and would have brought him home had Natalie not reappeared. Not that it would have influenced my vote had I known at the time I went down to the polling station, because I voted for him anyway. On occasion, he does act like a right prat, due in large part to his personal loyalty to local LibDem big boy John Hemming. On the other hand, and why I voted for him, he's not particular bound by the party whip (in fact, I'm not even sure if politically he actually is a Liberal Democrat), his support for MiB has been wholehearted and hard working, and he's extremely accessible. If a constituent rings him up he, in my experience, responds very quickly. (I don't mean in my direct experience, but from what I've seen and heard from other people.) Finally, of course, we're in a quiz team together, where he puts aside political differences to sit alongside a former Labour Councillor, as we lord our trivia knowledge over the village.

It's a fun game, and now I never need to play it again.