On 5 June 2014, 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 held for the UK parliamentary

constituency An electoral (congressional, legislative, etc.) district, sometimes called a constituency, riding, or ward, is a geographical portion of a political unit, such as a country, state or province, city, or administrative region, created to provi ...

of Newark, following the resignation of

Patrick Mercer Patrick John Mercer (born 26 June 1956) is a British author and former politician. He was elected as a Conservative in the 2001 general election, until resigning the party's parliamentary whip in May 2013 following questions surrounding paid ad ...

. Conservative

Robert Jenrick Robert Edward Jenrick (born 9 January 1982) is a British politician who has been Shadow Secretary of State for Justice and Shadow Lord Chancellor since November 2024. He served in the Cabinet as Minister of State for Immigration from 2022 to ...

won the seat with a majority of 7,403.

Background

Mercer resigned the Conservative Party whip on 31 May 2013 after an investigation by the BBC's ''

Panorama A panorama (formed from Greek language, Greek πᾶν "all" + ὅραμα "view") is any Obtuse angle, wide-angle view or representation of a physical space, whether in painting, drawing, photography (panoramic photography), film, seismic image ...

'' programme regarding allegations of paid lobbying without registering the interest. He was paid £4,000 for asking questions in Parliament, and the ''Panorama'' team considered that he asked five parliamentary questions, but declared only £2,000 of the £4,000. As a consequence, he said at the time that he would not stand in the 2015 general election. On 29 April, after being told that the Committee on Standards would recommend that he be suspended from the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of ...

for six months, Mercer announced that he would resign his seat: he told journalists on College Green that he was standing down from "God's county of Nottinghamshire". Mercer was appointed Steward and Bailiff of the Three Chiltern Hundreds on 30 April 2014, a mechanism by which MPs resign. The writ was moved on 1 May 2014 for the by-election to be held on 5 June.

Candidates

The nominations closed at 4pm on Tuesday 13 May with 11 candidates being nominated. The local Conservative Party had already selected

to fight the seat. Jenrick trained as a solicitor and was a director of

Christie's Christie's is a British auction house founded in 1766 by James Christie (auctioneer), James Christie. Its main premises are on King Street, St James's in London, and it has additional salerooms in New York, Paris, Hong Kong, Milan, Geneva, Shan ...

auction house. He is married with two children. Labour selected 27-year-old councillor Michael Payne, a former students' union president and current deputy leader of

Gedling Borough Council Gedling is a village and former civil parish which gives its name to the larger Borough of Gedling in Nottinghamshire, England. It lies north-east of Nottingham city centre. The parish was abolished in 1935 and absorbed into the urban distri ...

. The Liberal Democrats chose David Watts, leader of

Broxtowe Borough Council Broxtowe refers to a number of geographic entities, current and historic, in Nottinghamshire, England: * Broxtowe, Nottingham, a housing estate in Apsley ward, within the City of Nottingham * Broxtowe (UK Parliament constituency), the constituency ...

Nigel Farage Nigel Paul Farage ( ; born 3 April 1964) is a British politician and broadcaster who has been Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) for Clacton (UK Parliament constituency), Clacton and Leader of Reform UK since 20 ...

was immediately interviewed on the evening of 29 April and said he was "tempted" to stand, but the next morning he ruled himself out.

UKIP The UK Independence Party (UKIP, ) is a Eurosceptic, right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom. The party reached its greatest level of success in the mid-2010s, when it gained two Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), member ...

instead announced that outspoken former Conservative and current UKIP MEP for the East Midlands

Roger Helmer Roger Helmer (born 25 January 1944) is a British politician and businessman. He was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for the East Midlands region from 1999 to 2017. Before becoming an MEP, he was a business executive. Helmer was electe ...

would stand in the by-election. The Bus Pass Elvis Party leader and perennial election candidate, David Bishop, announced on 6 May that he would stand in the by-election after taking fourth place ahead of the Liberal Democrats in a recent local authority by-election in Clifton North ward, Nottingham.Alex Britton
"Patrick Mercer 'deliberately evaded' MPs' rules, watchdog finds"
, ''Nottingham Post'', 6 May 2014

Result

The Conservatives retained the seat with a majority of over 7,000 which was described by the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

as 'a relatively comfortable victory'. While UKIP's performance decreased the Conservative majority the BBC's Alex Forsyth said this was 'not as much as Mr Farage had hoped - or predicted'. Christopher Hope, writing in ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

'', argued that 'the scale of the victory is a vindication for the Tory high command which mounted a huge effort to win the seat' and claimed that

David Cameron David William Donald Cameron, Baron Cameron of Chipping Norton (born 9 October 1966) is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2010 to 2016. Until 2015, he led the first coalition government in the UK s ...

'had halted the momentum of Ukip'.

George Osborne George Gideon Oliver Osborne (born 23 May 1971) is a British retired politician and newspaper editor who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2010 to 2016 and as First Secretary of State from 2015 to 2016 in the Cameron government. A ...

hailed his party's victory and noted that it was the first time the Conservative's had held a seat at a by-election while in government for 25 years. However, both Nigel Farage and Labour's

Chris Bryant Sir Christopher John Bryant (born 11 January 1962) is a British politician and former Anglican priest who has served as Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) for Rhondda and Ogmore (UK Parliament constituency), Rhondda ...

suggested that the Conservative performance was not particularly impressive. It was suggested by

Owen Jones Owen Jones (born 8 August 1984) is a left-wing British newspaper columnist, commentator, journalist, author and political activist. He writes a column for ''The Guardian'' and contributes to the ''New Statesman'', ''Tribune (magazine), Tribune ...

in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' that "Labour and Lib Dem voters clearly voted tactically to keep Ukip out". The poor performance for the Liberal Democrats was described by the BBC as one of 'worst performances in a post-war English by-election' for the party or its predecessors, and by ''The Telegraph'' as 'a disaster' for the party.

Polling

Previous result

Notes