Liz Truss increases majority in South West Norfolk

Norfolk South West Labour candidate Emily Blake. Picture: Simon Parkin (Image: Archant)

The Conservative MP, who was appointed International Trade Secretary by Boris Johnson in July and has been a high profile supporter, was contesting the seat against Emily Blake (Labour), Josie Ratcliffe (Lib Dem), and Pallavi Devulapalli (Green).

She inherited the seat from Christopher Fraser in 2010 with a majority of 13,140 and had also increased her majority in both 2015 and 2017.

She said: "I'm very pleased and I think the results across the country show real strong backing for Boris Johnson, getting Brexit done and moving on from the three years of indecision we have had.

Having backing remain in the referendum, she added: "I'm a democrat and I think people were getting frustrated that something they had voted for three years ago hadn't happened."

She added: "I'm really pleased that we have won in North Norfolk. More Conservative MPs in Norfolk is great news. It means we can push hard for things like the A47.

"The most important thing is we sort of Norfolk's infrastructure, the poor mobile phone reception and broadband and make sure we are funding our schools."

Labour candidate Emily Blake said she had received a positive reaction to issues she raised on the doorstep but it had been overshadowed by Brexit.

"The campaign was so quick but we got a nice response. It felt pretty positive going around but we had the same things we heard nationwide on why they wouldn't vote Labour and it was heavily focussed on Brexit and that is reflected in the results today," she said.

Adding a splash of colour to proceedings and posing for photos with the winning MP was Earl Elvis of Outwell (Monster Raving Loony Party), - aka Ashley Inwood, whose policies included nationalising the Dad's Army Museum in Thetford and bringing the beach to Wisbech. He said his core support is "people who don't really vote"