Could the Tory’s Blue Wall in Godalming & Ash be about to crash?
Could Waverley’s Council Leader Paul Follows, who, in addition to his day job with BAE Systems and running the borough council of Waverley & the Town council of Godalming campaigning around the borough, on his bike capture the seat for the Liberal Democrats?
Sadly, Westminster’s loss is now Waverley’s gain. As you will see from the Godalming & Ash General Election results, he lost by a mere 891 votes.
Waverley & Guildford Election Results.
To have polled 22,402 votes was no mean feat for Paul Follows in once True Blue Waverley, and wasn’t it amazing that Ruby Tucker for The Greens didn’t set foot in Waverley but polled 1,243 votes? It was a very different political scene, with Labour pulling in more voters and Reform appearing for the first time, polling 4,815 votes. The Full list is in the link above.
Jeremy Hunt had no Portillo moment; we congratulate him on his fine-tuned and hard-won win. His letter on the election day almost convinced us to vote for him even though our constituency is now Farnham & Bordon. It brought crocodile tears to our eyes.
So, at the end of a tumultuous election round in 2024, there isn’t much for Jeremy Hunt to crow about. He lost his Conservative colleague in Guildford when Angela Richardson (14,508) lost by a huge margin to her Liberal Democrat opponent, Zoe Franklin. (22,937) He also lost hundreds of his Tory colleagues at Westminster.
But, crowing, he is not. He wrote this very conciliatory letter to his constituents. Let us all hope he can meet and WORK with the Leader of Waverley Borough Council on this occasion to fight for the improvements this constituency needs.
Dear Godalming and Ash constituents,
As you will know by now, I was re-elected early on Friday morning on a reduced majority of 891. I want to thank you for placing your trust in me.
This was the most arduous campaign I have ever fought. With my team we knocked on 600 doors every day for the entire election campaign. I personally met a couple of thousand people on doorsteps – and if you were one of them thank you for the overwhelmingly friendly reception. ‘Friendly’ does not of course mean you were going to vote for me! But one of the best things about our democracy is the way we keep our disagreements civil.
Many of the people who did vote for me made it clear they were not voting for another Conservative government. We lost the trust of the electorate and as I said in my speech when the result was announced we need to show humility and courage as we try to understand why. But putting your trust in me as local MP is an awesome responsibility in its own right and I am deeply humbled you chose to do so.
I have some thank you’s; firstly to thank Pedro Wrobel and the team at Waverley who did an impeccable job organising the election – both on the day and at the count. In such a tight election that was no mean feat and we were all extremely grateful for their professionalism.
Thank you as well to Paul Follows and the other candidates. Whatever our disagreements you kept this a clean fight in which, on the whole, personal attacks were avoided. That is so important if we are to maintain the dwindling trust of voters in politicians.
Thank you to my brilliant team who worked their socks off on my campaign. They delivered huge amounts of leaflets and letters (sorry for clogging up your letterboxes!), helped get our messages out on social media, canvassed and did telling on election day. It is quite a terrifying thing to knock on a stranger’s door for the first time and ask them their political opinion. But it is an important part of our democracy that we listen to voters and my team believe that from the bottom of their hearts.
Most of all thank you again to the people of Godalming and Ash for trusting me to be your voice in Westminster. This is going to be a challenging period for Conservatives but I will try to be a pragmatic and constructive voice of opposition in parliament as well as fighting for the local improvements we need.
Best wishes
Jeremy
Thankfully sanity prevailed but sadly Westminster’s gain is Waverley’s loss.
Of course Waverley now has TWO conservative MPs to deal with (we mustn’t forget Greg Stafford)
So now that the election is over and conservative MPs no longer have to blindly follow their Whip at Westminster, perhaps both Jeremy and Greg can work collaboratively with Paul Follows for the good of the residents, instead of attempting to score political points against each other (Greg not guilty) which they’ve been doing for yonks.
We can live in hope, but old habits die hard.
Yes, you are absolutely right. Everyone should now put politics with a BIG P behind them and work collaboratively to tackle the huge problems facing the borough and the country. Residents unable to get a GP or a dental appointment. Faced with using their life savings to fun a hip or knee operation due to failing health. Sewage swimming around the properties and low water pressure one minute amd burst pipes and flooding the next. We could go on – and this is affluent Surrey. Imagine what it is like in the Welsh valleys or in the North East. This is a part of the world that is true blue, where we all play bridge and drink gin and tonic and add up our share and property portfolio holdings isn’t it. A borough where many have private health insurance and kids in private schools.
The redrawing of political boundaries in the recent general election has had (imo) a negative effect for the town of Haslemere. We are now part of ‘Farnham and Borden’ with the subsequent loss of identity!
Who decided to erase Haslemere from the political map?
Answer: The Boundary Commissioners.
Lots of elected councillors try to work constructively with Paul Follows but they tell me to no avail as he just doesn’t listen as he knows best. It’s a shame as he undoubtedly has attributes but listening isn’t one of them.
No doubt he has been on a bit of a learning curve during the past few weeks along with Jeremy Hunt. Perhaps they both need to listen, because the electorate are sick and tired of politicians warring among themselves whilst polishing their ego’s and forgetting who they represent and why?