Tony Devenish, who has held his seat as West Central’s General London Assembly member for the Conservatives, has cited reopening Hammersmith Bridge a priority following his narrow re-election over Labour’s Rita Begum.
Incumbent Devenish, who secured 1.6% majority, winning 38.9% of the vote compared to Begum’s 37,3% also stated he will continue to hold the next Mayor of London to account.
He said: “I work every day pretty much. I love what I do, we’ll be back in City Hall on Sunday and I will be back doing case work tonight.
“It’s a great honour to represent West Central for the second time.”
Devenish said he would be celebrating with a trip to the pub to “support our West London economy and turbo-charge the economy going forward.”
The Conservative also paid tribute to all those who had been involved in the democratic process.
He added: “Thank you mister returning officer, not only for what you’ve done today, to you and all your staff and local councillors for all you’ve done particularly in the last year during Covid working with our NHS, communities and businesses.
“I’d also like to thank everyone who voted regardless of party, our police, and our one-nation Conservative government, and our Prime Minister.
“Thank you all, it has been a huge pleasure. Finally, I’d like to thank Rita Begum and all the other candidates who stood.”
The Green Party and Liberal Democrat candidates for West Central also shared their reactions to the election.
Green Party candidate Zack Polanski came third in the election and said he was proud that West Central delivered the Greens their best vote share yet with 11.6%.
Polanski said: “I think it’s clear, and I hope Tony Devenish heard it loud and clear that people care about environmental justice, they care about social justice.
“Here in London we’ve run a fantastic campaign.”
Polanski, who is also standing as a list candidate, also said that a picnic was planned in the next few days to thank all the Green activists and members for their hard work.
They delivered over a million leaflets across London.
The Liberal Democrats candidate Ted Townsend was disappointed with fourth in the election.
He said: “We were hoping to out-perform the Greens.
“On the other hand, we increased our share of the vote by more than 50% so I think the message is getting through and hopefully all goes well for next year’s local elections.”
Featured image credit: Shosha Adie
