Mike thanks North & Leith for "Spectacular Support"

4.08.55pm BST (GMT +0100) Wed 11th May 2005

Mike Crockart today thanked the voters of Edinburgh North & Leith for their "spectacular" support in last weeks General Election poll.

Last week saw Mike's vote surge by almost 9% to over 29% of the vote, only 5% or 2153 votes behind the Labour Party.

Mike said, "This was a fantastic result for us. It was a ringing endorsement for the positive policies of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. The more that people heard about our policies, the more they liked them and the final vote shows that."

If you vote Lib Dem, you'll get Lib Dem, especially in North & Leith

The result echoes the prediction made by the Liberal Democrat team in the April FOCUS delivered during the campaign which stated, "Labour's lead in Edinburgh North & Leith has already halved to just 3000 votes with the Liberal Democrats poised to close the gap further." Mike Crockart commented, "All along we knew it was close between us and the Labour Party and we said so, honestly and clearly. Unfortunately some of the other parties resorted to scare tactics to try to stop their voters moving over to support the Liberal Democrats. Now those lies are laid bare. Now it is clear there is only one real challenger to Labour in Edinburgh North & Leith. People will remember that the truth here is, if you vote Lib Dem, you'll get Lib Dem."

Result in full:

Mark Lazarowicz Labour 14597 34.2% -7.7%

Mike Crockart Liberal Democrat 12444 29.2% +8.9%

Iain Whyte Conservative 7969 18.7% -0.0%

David Hutchison SNP 4344 10.2% -4.2%

Mark Sydenham Green 2482 5.8% +5.8%

Bill Scott SSP 804 1.9% -1.7%

Majority of 2153

8.3% swing from Labour to the Liberal Democrats