London Assembly election, 2008

An election to the Assembly of London took place on 1 May, 2008, along with the London mayoral election, 2008. The Conservatives gained 2 seats, Labour gained one seat, the Liberal Democrats lost two seats, and United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) or One London as they became were wiped out. Notably, a candidate for the British National Party (BNP) was elected for the first time.

The Assembly is elected by the Additional Member System. There are fourteen directly elected constituencies, all of which have, to date, only ever been won by the Conservative Party or the Labour Party. An additional eleven members are allocated by a London wide top-up vote with the proviso that parties must win at least five percent of the vote to qualify for the list seats. Prior to these elections, these seats were held by five Liberal Democrats, two Labour Party members, two Green Party members and two One Londoners.

The two One London members were elected as candidates for the UK Independence Party, but then joined or supported the breakaway Veritas party and subsequently left Veritas to form One London. Compared to the previous election, two separate factions of RESPECT Unity Coalition stood in 2008: Respect (George Galloway), who supported Ken Livingstone in the mayoral election, and Left List, who supported Lindsey German (RESPECT's mayoral candidate in 2004).

Constituency (First Past the Post) results

Labour gained Brent and Harrow from Conservative (which had been the only constituency seat changing hands in 2004, having then been gained from Labour). The other 13 constituencies remained unchanged, with the two Liberal Democrat challenges, in South West against the Conservatives, and Lambeth and Southwark against Labour, both showing swings against the Liberal Democrats. The Labour-Conservative marginal, with just 1.3% majority, of Enfield and Haringey was defended by Labour with only a tiny swing to the Conservatives. Thus the Labour campaign for the London Assembly was considerably more successful than their campaign in the local elections held on the same day, where they suffered losses of over 330 councillors. [ [http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/may/02/london08.london1 London assembly results | Politics | guardian.co.uk ] ]

London Assembly representation

† Both UKIP Assembly members had subsequently defected and formed the new One London party.

New members

* Gareth Bacon (Conservative Party, London list)
* Richard Barnbrook (British National Party, London list)
* Andrew Boff (Conservative Party, London list)
* Victoria Borwick (Conservative Party, London list)
* James Cleverly (Conservative Party, Bexley and Bromley)
* Kit Malthouse (Conservative Party, West Central)
* Steve O'Connell (Conservative Party, Croydon and Sutton)
* Caroline Pidgeon (Liberal Democrats, London list)
* Navin Shah (Labour Party, Brent and Harrow)
* Richard Tracey (Conservative Party, Merton and Wandsworth)

Defeated members

* Bob Blackman (Conservative Party, Brent and Harrow)
* Damian Hockney (One London, London list)
* Peter Hulme Cross (One London, London list)
* Geoff Pope (Liberal Democrats, London list)

Retiring members

* Angie Bray (Conservative Party, West Central)
* Sally Hamwee (Liberal Democrats, London list)
* Elizabeth Howlett (Conservative Party, Merton and Wandsworth)
* Bob Neill (Conservative Party, Bexley and Bromley)
* Andrew Pelling (Conservative Party, Croydon and Sutton)
* Graham Tope (Liberal Democrats, London list)

References

External links

* [http://www.londonelects.org.uk/candidates/the_candidates.aspx Full list of candidates for constituency and list sections]