Election 2019: North East Cambs voters have four to choose from when they go to the polls today

Today (Thursday) the people of North East Cambridgeshire will be off to the polls to choose their MP for the next five years.

Conservative Steve Barclay hopes he will be returned for a fourth time but he has three opponents bidding to take his place.

Labour’s Diane Boyd is hoping to build on the headway her predecessor Ken Rustidge made at the last election in 2017. He managed to increase the party’s share of the vote by over 10 per cent.

But Mr Barclay also built on his majority, increasing it by over nine per cent to 21,270 – he polled a whopping 34,340 votes.

Also vying for the votes of the 83,699 eligible electors in our constituency are the Green Party’s Ruth Johnson and the Liberal Democrats’ Rupert Moss-Eccardt.

In 2017 the Lib Dems held their position with voters, neither gaining or losing their percentage share. However, Mrs Johnson will be hoping to do better than her last performance when her party’s share of the vote dropped by over one per cent, with her as the candidate polling 1,024 votes.

Both the Conservatives and Labour improved their performances last time around at the expense of UKIP, whose percentage of the voting was cut by over 18 per cent.

UKIP is not fielding a candidate this time, nor are the Brexit Party, with their would-be candidate Paul Bullen forced to withdraw at the 11th hour after party leader Nigel Farage struck a deal with Tory leader, Boris Johnson, not to contest seats where the Tories are expected to win.

Polling stations open tomorrow at 7am and close at 10pm – your polling card will tell you where you should go to vote – but the candidates will have to wait around five hours to find out what the North East Cambridgeshire electorate have decided once voting ends.

The local result is expected to be announced at around 5am. Counting of the votes cast must be under way by 2am after verification has been completed.

Boxes from polling stations are expected to take up to an hour to get to the Hudson Centre in Wisbech, where the count is being held.

In 2017 our result was known at 6.30am, making it one of the last half dozen nationally to be announced.

Read what the candidates are promising here.