Muck&Brass was pleased to be at the Wessex Rooms at 10:30pm this evening when the result of the election for the vacant seat on Somerton Town Council was announced.
The atmosphere in the hall was electric (OK M&B exaggerates a little) but it was clear that this election had managed to stir something in Somerton's electorate. Four members of SSDC staff went at the job of counting the votes and there were substantial piles of paper on the counting desks by the time the returning officer was able to announce the result, which was:
Pat Bennett 555 votes
Michael Fraser-Hopewell 413 votes
Dean Ruddle 236 votes
Pat Bennett was therefore duly elected to serve on Somerton's Town Council and this means that Pat Bennett is the ONLY councillor on Somerton Town Council with an electoral mandate.
M&B wishes Pat Bennett every success in her term of office and warns the community against any suggestion of an Obama style expectation of change. Vested interests are deeply entrenched and will resist any effort to introduce democracy to Somerton Town Council. None-the-less, Pat and the other candidates, Michael Hopewell-Fraser and Dean Ruddle, are to be congratulated on being able to attract more than 30% of the electorate to the polling station. This indicates the growing depth of feeling in the wider community that Somerton Town Council, under its current leadership, has outstayed its welcome.
Special mention should go to SSDC staffers Anne Chislet, Donna Thorne, Linda Creek and David Cheers who managed the polling station as well as the count and the returning officer was Roger Quantock. (Apologies for any mis-spelling).