Lib Dems just miss by-election sensation in safe Tory seat!

4.50.13pm BST (GMT +0100) Fri 30th Jun 2006

The Liberal Democrats fell just 650 votes short of pulling off one of the most sensational by-election victories of all time.

When the result was finally declared in the early hours of the morning after a vote recount in the safe Conservative seat of Bromley Chislehurst, political journalists gasped with astonishment.

None had expected or predicted the sensational result that saw the Conservatives vote cut in half and a 12,000 Tory majority destroyed by the Lib Dems!

For Labour the night just got worse and worse. Their vote in Bromley collapsed completely from almost 11,000 to barely 2,000. They struggled home in an humiliating 4th place and lost their £750 deposit by failing to get 7,5% of the vote.

That disastrous performance was topped by their catastrophic failure to win back the previously "safe Labour seat" of Bleanau Gwent in Wales. Here the independent, anti-Labour candidates held comfortably both the UK Parliamentary and Welsh Assembly seats in yesterday's by-elections.

The morning after a desperate night for both Tony Blair and David Cameron only Sir Ming Campbell had a spring in his step and a smile on his face.

Ming's Lib Dems were the only Party that saw an increase in both their vote share and in the number of people voting for them in all three by-elections.

Following the capture of Dunfermline from Labour earlier in the year, the Bromley result shows that going forward no Tory or Labour seats are safe from the Lib Dems!