By Jenny Barwise

Last updated at 11:42, Friday, 19 December 2008

LABOUR retained the Kells and Sandwith seat in Whitehaven following yesterday’s by-election.

elected: Wendy Skillicorn

Mother-of-two Wendy Skillicorn won 418 of the 1,042 votes, beating the British National Party’s candidate Simon Nicholson by just 16 votes.

Brigid Anne Whiteside of the Conservative party got 190 votes.

Only 26.6 per cent of the ward turned up to cast their votes in polling stations across Kells and Sandwith.

The by-election was called to fill the vacant Cumbria County Council position left by Joe McAllister who died in July.

Mrs Skillicorn, 54, from Thornton Road, Hensingham, Whitehaven, was personal assistant to Copeland’s former MP, Jack Cunningham, for 10 years. She now works as an administrator at a Westlakes company.

BNP’s contender, Simon Nicholson, 35, is a former army lance corporal.

Conservative’s candidate, Mrs Whiteside is the wife of prospective Tory Copeland parliamentary candidate Chris Whiteside.

She also stood in the Copeland Council by-election in Harbour ward last autumn, where she finished second. Mr McAllister had been Labour county councillor for Kells and Sandwith since 1995.

He won comfortably when the seat was last contested in 2005, polling 1,367 votes – more than 1,000 ahead of his nearest challenger. k

First published at 11:26, Friday, 19 December 2008
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk