British Alliance’s Status Grows With New Election Victory

LONDON —  Britain’s centrist Alliance on Friday won its second by-election in two weeks by a record margin, boosting hopes of emerging as a credible third force in elections expected this year.

Matthew Taylor, candidate for the Liberal Party, which forms the Alliance with the Social Democrats, retained the seat in Truro, in the southwestern county of Cornwall, and at 24 became the youngest member of parliament.

His margin of 14,617 votes over second-placed Conservative candidate Nicholas St. Aubyn was also the largest in Liberal history.

The seat was made vacant by the death in a car crash last December of Liberal member of Parliament David Penhaligon, a popular politician who had increased his majority from 500 to 10,000 in 10 years.

Oxford Debater

Taylor, who was president of Oxford University’s prestigious debating society, the Oxford Union, and worked as a researcher for the Liberals, received 30,599 votes, or 60.4%, an increase of 3.1% over the last general election in 1983.

“I am absolutely delighted, this is part of the Alliance tide,” he said afterward. “We have proved we can win any seat in the country, urban or rural.”

The Conservative share of 32% was down 6.5% from the 1983 election, while Labor’s John King, a teacher who sings folk songs in the Cornish language, polled 7.1%, an increase of 2.5%.

The Liberal success follows the shock victory by the party’s Alliance partner in the London suburb of Greenwich two weeks ago, when the Social Democrats took a seat held by Labor for over 40 years.

It gives the Alliance 24 seats in the 650-seat House of Commons, the lower house of Parliament.