{"id":147552,"date":"2021-12-16T09:10:31","date_gmt":"2021-12-16T09:10:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/precoinnews.com\/?p=147552"},"modified":"2021-12-16T09:10:31","modified_gmt":"2021-12-16T09:10:31","slug":"north-shropshire-by-election-voters-begin-to-cast-ballots-to-choose-owen-paterson-successor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/precoinnews.com\/politics\/north-shropshire-by-election-voters-begin-to-cast-ballots-to-choose-owen-paterson-successor\/","title":{"rendered":"North Shropshire by-election: Voters begin to cast ballots to choose Owen Paterson successor"},"content":{"rendered":"
Voters have begun to cast their ballots in the North Shropshire by-election as they choose a replacement for former Conservative MP Owen Paterson.<\/p>\n
From 7am this morning to 10pm tonight, voters in the constituency will decide on a new local MP following ex-cabinet minister Mr Paterson’s decision to quit the House of Commons last month.<\/p>\n
A result in the by-election is due to be declared in the early hours of Friday morning.<\/p>\n
Mr Paterson, who served as North Shropshire’s MP for 24 years, won the seat for the Conservatives at the 2019 general election with a near-23,000 majority.<\/p>\n
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Neil Shastri-Hurst, a barrister and former British Army medical officer, will be hoping to retain the constituency for the Tories as the party’s by-election candidate.<\/p>\n
But opposition parties will be looking to diminish Boris Johnson’s Commons majority by taking the seat away from the Conservatives.<\/p>\n
Labour’s candidate Ben Wood, who went to school in the constituency, and the Liberal Democrats’ Helen Morgan, a local chartered accountant who previously contested the seat at the 2019 election, will both be hoping to become the newest MP in the Commons.<\/p>\n
The Green Party’s Alistair Kerr, Reform UK’s Kirsty Walmsley, The Reclaim Party’s Martin Daubney and UKIP’s Andrea Allen will also be looking for success.<\/p>\n
As will independent candidates Suzie Smith Akers and Yolande Kenward, James Elliot of the Heritage Party, Russell Dean of The Party Party, a Rejoin EU candidate known as Boris Been-Bunged, Lord Howling Hope of the Official Monster Raving Loony Party, and Earl Elvis Phillipe Jesse of the Freedom Alliance.<\/p>\n
Mr Paterson resigned<\/strong> from the Commons in November in order to escape “the cruel world of politics”.<\/p>\n It came after a furious row over his proposed suspension from the Commons for breaching lobbying rules.<\/p>\n The North Shropshire contest is the second by-election in two weeks’, following Conservative candidate Louie French’s victory in Old Bexley and Sidcup at the beginning of December.<\/p>\n That vote was triggered by the death of former MP and cabinet minister James Brokenshire<\/strong>.<\/p>\n