More than 30,000 didn’t vote in local election ward

As Steve Witherden woke up this morning, or afternoon, as the first Labour MP to represent our area, his political rivals have been magnanimous in defeat, but are already plotting for the Welsh elections in less than two years’ time.

Mr Witherden, a secondary school teacher from the Glyndwr area of the new constituency, beat five strong Montgomeryshire-based candidates to succeed former Conservative Craig Williams MP, who was relegated to third by the ReformUK candidate Oliver Lewis in an extraordinary night of local politics.

It all started well for Mr Williams, who was suspended by his party last month for allegations of insider betting on the election date, with the exit polls remarkably declaring at 10pm that he would return to his seat with a probability rate of 97%.

But as the party observers circled the counting desks like hawks, it became apparent that a clear winner was emerging that would mirror the national story.

By 2am in the Builth Wells counting centre, parties were starting to conceded defeat, but Reform UK could still sniff a sensational night’s work.

In the end, Mr Witherden was declared the winner with 12,709 votes at around 5am, with both Mr Williams and Mr Lewis congratulating him with speeches on the stage.

Mr Williams finished his speech by apologising to his team and family for the controversy that his Gambling Commission investigation had caused.

He will now focus on that investigation, as well as rebuilding his political career, but Plaid Cymru’s Elwyn Vaughan is already plotting for the Senedd elections in 2026.

“This is the best ever result for Plaid Cymru - doubling our previous best in 2010 and provides a firm base for the future,” he said this morning.

“Thank you for your support, it is humbling, and we will continue to campaign for our communities and challenge those in power.”

Sources inside to local Liberal Democrats, who finished fourth, told us they will be immediately focussing on raising their Cardiff presence and called their man, Glyn Preston, an “excellent candidate”.

The Green Party polled 1,744 votes on their return to the local ballot paper, and we can expect to hear a lot more from their candidate Jeremy Brignell-Thorp moving forward, particularly with the party making a national impact last night by winning four seats.

But a somewhat depressing statistic from the evening was that only 58.69% of the 74,039-electorate bothered to vote. That means that a whopping 30,582 people didn’t vote.

While the parties will carry out inquests into what went well, and what didn’t over the past six weeks of campaigning, that staggering figure of no-shows will be one issue they will all agree needs addressing.

The Montgomeryshire & Glyndwr result

Steve Witherden (Labour): 12,709 votes

Oliver Lewis (Reform UK): 8,894

Craig Williams (Independent): 7,775

Glyn Preston (Liberal Democrats): 6,470

Elwyn Vaughan (Plaid Cymru): 5,667

Jeremy Brignell-Thorp (Green Party): 1,744