It has finally arrived, polling day is here and the result, as this is being written on Thursday morning, is generally regarded as too uncertain to call. By 7pm the Rye Community Centre polling station was reporting a high turnout despite the weather.
So how will this effect Hastings and Rye? The front-runners are clearly Sally-Ann Hart for the Conservatives and Peter Chowney for Labour. It would take a major upset indeed to put Nick Perry for the Lib Dems in as our MP (although in the present situation, a major upset should never be discounted).
At the last election, and following the trend set by the national result, Amber Rudd’s majority was cut to the slimmest of margins – just 346. Will the constituency again reflect the national result? In the referendum Hastings and Rye had a majority voting leave. The Conservative candidate also supports leave while the Labour and Lib Dem candidates are staunch remainers. Will this make a difference and help Sally-Ann Hart, or has the mood changed in the last three years since the referendum with remain now more in favour, perhaps benefiting Peter Chowney and Nick Perry?
This is not only considered by the politicians and political pundits to be the most significant election in the voting lifetime of most of us, but to addicted election-watchers, such as this writer, it has to be the most fascinating. Rye News, therefore, will be keeping an election watch until our constituency has declared. Below, we will bring you the results of the exit poll as soon as it is known and how that might effect Hastings and Rye until the result is declared here, probably sometime between 2:30am and 3:30am, following which we will shut down and leave our readers to celebrate, or drown their sorrows, according to their personal views.
10pm: Exit poll suggests:
| Party | Seats |
|---|---|
| Conservatives | 368 |
| Labour | 191 |
| Liberal Democrats | 13 |
Giving the Conservatives a majority of 86 which will mean that Conservatives will hold Hastings and Rye with a significantly increased majority and Sally-Ann Hart will be our next MP.
3.40am: Hastings and Rye declared:
| Candidate | Votes |
|---|---|
| Sally-Ann Hart (Conservative) | 26,896 |
| Peter Chowney (Labour) | 22,853 |
| Nick Perry (Liberal Democrat) | 3,960 |
| Paul Crosland (Independent) | 565 |
Sally-Ann Hart is elected with an increased Conservative majority of 4,043
Image Credits: Rye News library .