A by-election was held on 9 July 2010 in

Dominica Dominica, officially the Commonwealth of Dominica, is an island country in the Caribbean. It is part of the Windward Islands chain in the Lesser Antilles archipelago in the Caribbean Sea. The capital, Roseau, is located on the western side of t ...

, to fill two seats in the

House of Assembly House of Assembly is a name given to the legislature or lower house of a bicameral parliament. In some countries this may be at a subnational level. Historically, in British Crown colonies as the colony gained more internal responsible g ...

that were declared vacant. The contested seats were both won by significant margins by the incumbent candidates, who were members of the opposition United Workers' Party. Following the results of the 2009 general election conducted on 18 December 2009, the

Dominica Labour Party The Dominica Labour Party is a centre-left social-democratic political party in Dominica. History Founded in 1955 by Phyllis Shand Allfrey and Emmanuel Christopher Loblack, the Dominica Labour Party is the oldest political party in Dominica. ...

won 18 of the 21 seats in the House of Assembly, with the United Workers' Party in the remaining three. Alleging election irregularities, the UWP members boycotted the Assembly. After two of the three UWP members, Edison James of Marigot and

Hector John Hector John (born 22 October 1970) is a Dominican politician in the United Workers' Party (UWP). He was the Leader of the Opposition, from 2010 to 2014 and was the youngest ever to hold that position. He was first elected as a Representative ...

Salisbury Salisbury ( , ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and civil parish in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers River Avon, Hampshire, Avon, River Nadder, Nadder and River Bourne, Wi ...

, did not attend three consecutive sessions of the Assembly,

Speaker of the House The speaker of a deliberative assembly, especially a legislative body, is its presiding officer, or the chair. The title was first used in 1377 in England. Usage The title was first recorded in 1377 to describe the role of Thomas de Hung ...

Alix Boyd Knights Hon. Eileen Alix Boyd-Knights (28 December 1944 — 29 August 2023) was a Dominican politician and attorney who was the Speaker of the House of Assembly from 2000 to 2020. Early life & education Eileen Alix Boyd was born in Dominica to par ...

declared their seats vacant, and a

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, or a bypoll in India, is an election used to fill an office that has become vacant between general elections. A vacancy may arise as a result of an incumben ...

was scheduled to fill the vacancies. The UWP argued that the Speaker had no legal authority to declare the seats vacant and that the by-elections were unconstitutional. James and John nevertheless ran in the by-election to retain their former seats. The Labour Party fielded the same candidates that ran unsuccessfully in the 2009 general election, Bentley Royer in Salisbury and

Dayton Baptiste Dayton Baptiste (born 1965) is a Dominican politician in the Dominica Labour Party, and a former police officer in Antigua. He served briefly as an appointed senator in the Dominica House of Assembly in 2010, and has twice been an unsuccessful can ...

in Marigot. Both Royer and Baptiste had been appointed as senators in the interim and resigned these positions to run in the by-election. No candidates from other parties participated in the by-election. Both James and John won the by-election by even greater margins than in the general election, leaving no change in the distribution of seats in the Assembly. John subsequently became the

Leader of the Opposition The Leader of the Opposition is a title traditionally held by the leader of the Opposition (parliamentary), largest political party not in government, typical in countries utilizing the parliamentary system form of government. The leader of the ...

Results by constituency

References

*. *. *. *. *. *. Elections in Dominica 2010 in Dominica 2010 elections in the Caribbean By-elections July 2010 in North America {{Dominican elections