Elections to

Hartlepool Hartlepool () is a seaside and port town in County Durham, England. It is the largest settlement and administrative centre of the Borough of Hartlepool. With an estimated population of 90,123, it is the second-largest settlement in County ...

Borough Council in the

ceremonial county The counties and areas for the purposes of the lieutenancies, also referred to as the lieutenancy areas of England and informally known as ceremonial counties, are areas of England to which lords-lieutenant are appointed. Legally, the areas i ...

of County Durham in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

were held on 2 May 2002. One third of the council was up for election and the council stayed under no overall control. At the same time an election took place for a directly elected mayor, which was won by

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independe ...

candidate

Stuart Drummond Stuart Drummond (born 29 November 1973) was the first and only directly elected mayor of Hartlepool in North East England.Oliver Wright, ''Monkey business turns serious for Hartlepool''. The Times. London (UK): May 4, 2002. pg. 13 He was fir ...

Mayoral election

Campaign

Five candidates stood in the election for mayor, one each from the three main political parties and two independents. The Labour candidate for mayor was Leo Gillen, a local businessman who had led the campaign in favour of introducing a directly elected mayor. The Liberal Democrats selected the leader of the council since 2000, Arthur Preece, as their candidate for mayor, while the Conservatives chose

councillor A councillor is an elected representative for a local government council in some countries. Canada Due to the control that the provinces have over their municipal governments, terms that councillors serve vary from province to province. Unl ...

Stephen Close. The first independent candidate, Stuart Drummond, was better known as H'Angus the Monkey the official

mascot A mascot is any human, animal, or object thought to bring luck, or anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name. Mascots are also used as fic ...

for the local football team Hartlepool United F.C. The other independent candidate was Ian Cameron, another local businessman. Drummond campaigned on a pledge to give free

banana A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry (botany), berry – produced by several kinds of large herbaceous flowering plants in the genus ''Musa (genus), Musa''. In some countries, Cooking banana, bananas used for ...

s to all school

pupils The pupil is a black hole located in the center of the iris of the eye that allows light to strike the retina.Cassin, B. and Solomon, S. (1990) ''Dictionary of Eye Terminology''. Gainesville, Florida: Triad Publishing Company. It appears black ...

under 11 in Hartlepool. He received backing from the football club who paid his deposit and he promised that he would attempt to keep a local sports centre open, improve sporting facilities, tackle crime and reduce the number of councillors. His candidacy began as something of a joke but became more serious as he attracted support during the campaign. A supplementary voting system was used in the mayoral election with second preferences being used if no candidate received over half of the vote. A local

bookmaker A bookmaker, bookie, or turf accountant is an organization or a person that accepts and pays off bets on sporting and other events at agreed-upon odds. History The first bookmaker, Ogden, stood at Newmarket in 1795. Range of events Book ...

initially made Drummond a 100–1 outsider in the mayoral election but soon had to suspend betting after receiving a lot of bets from local people.

Results

Stuart Drummond won the mayoral election defeating the Labour candidate Leo Gillen on second preferences. Drummond said that his victory was due to disillusionment with local politicians and said that he was serious about doing a good job for Hartlepool as mayor. Local

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house ...

Peter Mandelson Peter Benjamin Mandelson, Baron Mandelson (born 21 October 1953) is a British Labour Party politician who served as First Secretary of State from 2009 to 2010. He was President of the Board of Trade in 1998 and from 2008 to 2010. He is the ...

praised Drummond on his victory and described him as being "very committed". However other political opponents described the results as having made Hartlepool "a laughing stock".

Council election

In the previous election in 2000 the Labour Party had lost control of the council which since then had been run by a coalition between the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives. Elections took place in 16 of the 17 wards with only Greatham ward not holding an election. Most attention was on the mayoral election but there was a large swing of 14.2% to Labour in the council election. However they were only able to gain one seat in Seaton ward from the Conservatives. After the election, the composition of the council was * Labour 23 * Liberal Democrat 12 *

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

8 *

Independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independe ...

Summary of results

Ward results

References

{{United Kingdom local elections, 2002 2002 English local elections

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains independence from Indonesia and ...

Mayoral elections in England 2000s in County Durham May 2002 events in the United Kingdom