In uk.politics.electoral David Boothroyd <david@election.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <memo.20031024181937.1956m@a01-09-5548.rosenstiel.cix.co.uk>,
> rosenstiel@cix.co.uk wrote:
 
>> Lewisham LBC                            Lewisham Central
>> LD 1054 (41.9;+19.9), Lab 869 (34.5;-6.8), Con 354 (14.1;-1.6), 
>> Green 154 (6.1;-14.9), UKIP 44 (1.7;+1.7), CPA 41 (1.6;+1.6)
>> Majority 185. Turnout 24%. LD gain from Lab. Last fought 2002.
 
> Labour vote actually held up quite reasonably from 2002 - what happened
> here was just that the Green voters lined up behind the Lib Dems. Very
> disappointing turnout for an all-postal ballot.

The figures are misleading. The last time this three-member ward was
contested was in the all-out elections of May 2002. In those elections
the Liberal Democrats and the Greens both had just one candidate.
Under the circumstances of a multi-member election in which a party
has less than the full slate, the party share is usually taken by
counting the vote for the top candidate of each party. In this case,
however, it is probably reasonable to suppose that a great many people
used one of the their three votes for the single Green Party candidate and
another for the single Liberal Democrat candidate. So it doesn't make
sense to think of there being a separate Green vote and Liberal Democrat
vote, and one switching to the other. 

Matthew Huntbach