1973 Chester-le-Street by-election

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1973 Chester-le-Street by-election

The by-election was held on 1 March 1973 for the Chester-le-Street constituency after Labour MP Norman Pentland died aged 60 on 28 October 1972. Pentland had held the seat since a 1956 by-election.

Labour chose Giles Radice, then head of the Research Department of the General and Municipal Workers’ Union, as their candidate. The Conservatives selected Neil Balfour, a merchant banker, and the Liberal candidate was George Suggett, an antique dealer from Newbury who was born in the area. The Liberals had not stood in Chester-le-Street in a general election since 1929; Suggett had previously run for Newbury in 1945 for the Common Wealth Party.

Chester-le-Street was known as a very safe Labour seat. Although the Conservatives were hoping for little in the way of a breakthrough, the Liberals were enjoying a surge in by-election results around that time. A controversy over Radice’s Labour selection surfaced during the campaign, with accusations that union influence had affected the local party’s choice.

The results were Labour 25,874 votes (53.06%), Liberal 18,808 votes (38.57%), Conservative 4,092 votes (8.39%). Turnout was 71.4%. Radice held the seat for Labour with a majority of 7,066; Balfour lost his deposit.

Radice remained the MP for Chester-le-Street until the seat was abolished in 1983, when he stood for North Durham and served as a Labour MP until 2001. Suggett did not stand again in Parliament, while Balfour stood again in the February 1974 general election but finished third behind the Liberals.