Count Binface wins 26.9% of votes in Clacton by-election
Count Binface receives over a quarter of votes in Clacton by-election
Count Binface, the self-styled intergalactic space warrior, received nearly 10,000 votes in the Clacton by-election, his best performance yet. The comedian Jon Harvey, who plays the character, came second behind Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, who retained his seat with 63.3% of the vote. Binface's previous attempts included challenges to three prime ministers. The result highlights the British tradition of novelty candidates, which dates back to the Monster Raving Loony Party and the £500 deposit introduced in 1985.
I promised to be a local champion for Clacton and I thought to hear the verdict of the Clactonites was the least I could do.
- delichon
Some of his planks:
* Cut your taxes, and raise everyone else’s.
* Nationalize Adele.
* Build at least one affordable house.
* Hold a referendum on whether Pluto should regain its planet status.
I see the attraction.
- tromp
> Binface received 26.9% of the vote
> That's why Count Binface has been able to stand in so many high-profile elections. He has, however, lost his £500 every time, after failing to meet the minimum 5% of votes cast in order for his deposit to be returned.
It would seem he didn't lose his £500 this time...
- wood_spirit
Britain has a first-past-the-post election system so the candidate with the most votes wins in each constituency.
As Farage didn’t get an absolute majority last time, and as a majority of voters didn’t even vote last time, I was extrapolating that Count Binface had a real chance. Not just as a protest vote, but a magnet for everyone not supporting Farage as well as everyone wanting a laugh (in a British boaty-mcboatface way).
Perhaps a serious clean-up-politics neutral candidate would have done better, like Martin Bell - a very well known war correspondent - who stood on an anti corruption ticket against the scandal riddled Conservative Neil Hamilton in Tatton in 1997.
- simonbarker87
Never thought I’d see my home town being discussed here. I no longer live there but regularly go back.
It’s not a great town but it’s also not truly awful. It’s a reasonably deprived town that harks back to its former grand past with an older demographic constantly topped up by people retiring there from east London.
There’s a lot of very nice people who are mortified that Farage is the MP and that the town has become a political joke. I struggle to see how people can vote for Farage but if you walk around the town center (which is perfectly safe like all of the UK is regardless of what social media and US news outlets say) you can understand why people want some change.
In reality there’s no well paid jobs and, with the aging demographic and no reason for anything to be based there, no reason for there to ever be any sadly.
Also Farage is in the district a lot more than the media makes out, I hear enough second and third hand sightings of him that he must be there more than once a month.
- jerf
Really appreciate the pictures showing the evolution of the costume over the years. He's put some real solid work into it.
Also, Monty Python's own take on the phenomenon, for those who haven't seen it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVI5ZOT5QEM
- cs702
Reminds me of the Black Mirror episode in which a blue animated bear named Waldo nearly wins a by-election:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Waldo_Moment
Reality these days sometimes feels as strange as fiction.
- tolugenius
Can someone in the UK explained how the country has fared with multiple PMs since Borris Johnson? My read as an outsider is it would take another brexit exit (a singular, definable political question that can cleanly classified in a binary label) to create a unifier but I also have no idea what that could be (ai, immigration, climate change, etc are too load bearing and multifaceted to see such a clean binary moment).
- immmmmm
The contributed proposition by the 10 year old kid to make fossil fuel companies pay for solar panels is perhaps the best policy proposal I’ve ever seen.
The second one is to make water companies CEOs swim in the Thames.
That is a program.
- mrhottakes
Bumper sticker with a picture of Count Binface: "Don't blame me, I voted for the other guy!"
- wwarner
I long for the days when voting for outsiders was a fun way to fill out a ballot, back when election outcomes didn’t matter very much because the probable winners were all qualified to hold office.