The Cheadle by-election, in

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority, combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; comprising ten metropolitan boroughs: City of Manchester, Manchester, City of Salford, Salford ...

, England, was caused by the death of Patsy Calton, the

Liberal Democrat Several political parties from around the world have been called the Liberal Democratic Party or Liberal Democrats. These parties usually follow a liberal democratic ideology. Active parties Former parties See also *Liberal democracy *Lib ...

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

(MP) for Cheadle on 29 May 2005. The election was held on 14 July 2005. The Liberal Democrat candidate succeeding Calton was Stockport council leader Mark Hunter. The

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...

candidate was Stephen Day (who held the seat from

1987 File:1987 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The MS Herald of Free Enterprise capsizes after leaving the Port of Zeebrugge in Belgium, killing 193; Northwest Airlines Flight 255 crashes after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, k ...

to 2001, and lost to Calton in the 2005 general election). In his victory speech, Hunter described the campaign of the Conservatives as 'nasty' and 'misleading'. The campaign was marred by accusations of dirty tricks and ruthless

negative campaigning Negative campaigning is the process of deliberately spreading negative information about someone or something to worsen the public relations, public image of the described. A colloquial, and somewhat more derogatory, term for the practice is mud ...

, principally accusing the Conservative campaign. Both the Liberal Democrats and a local newspaper threatened legal action over inaccuracies and defamation in Conservative campaign leaflets. The most significant example was a Conservative leaflet that superimposed a headline about Hunter's voting record on crime with a headline from a local newspaper about a rape, prompting the Liberal Democrats to threaten legal action.Tory campaign has Lib Dem hallmark

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

Online, 13 July 2005 With only 4.6% of the vote the Labour Party candidate, Martin Miller, lost his deposit; Labour did not fight an energetic campaign in a seat that was a Liberal Democrat/Conservative marginal. With the exception of the

1997 Winchester by-election The 1997 Winchester by-election was a by-election to the UK House of Commons in the constituency of Winchester, Hampshire. Winchester was initially declared to have been won by Mark Oaten (Liberal Democrat) with a majority of two votes at the ...

, where the General Election result was annulled, it was the first seat to be defended in a by-election by the Liberal Democrats since their formation in 1988. Their predecessor parties last defended a seat in a by-election at Truro in 1987.

Result

Notes

External links

Campaign literature from the by-electionLib Dems win Cheadle - BBC NewsLib Dems name Cheadle candidate - BBC NewsLib Dems reveal by-election dateUKIP to miss Cheadle by-election
{{By-elections to the 54th UK Parliament 2005 elections in the United Kingdom 2005 in England 2000s in Greater Manchester By-elections to the Parliament of the United Kingdom in Greater Manchester constituencies Politics of the Metropolitan Borough of Stockport July 2005 events in the United Kingdom