Nick Cox wrote:
> I'm going to ignore the possibilities of ties for first place.
[...]
Luckily, I don't have to worry about ties, even if converted into *very*
precise percentages of the vote! The ten closest British constituency
races since 1918 are (kindly supplied by David Boothroyd via
http://www.election.demon.co.uk):
1 A.J. Flint (Derbyshire, Ilkeston, N Lab, 1931) 2
M. Oaten (Hampshire, Winchester, L Dem, 1997*) 2
3 Rt. Hon. F.D. Acland (Devon, Tiverton, L, 1923) 3
G.G. Jones (Carmarthenshire, Carmarthen, Lab, 1974(F)) 3
Sir H. Nicholls, Bt. (Northamptonshire, Peterborough, C,
1966) 3
T.W. Stamford (Leeds, West, Lab, 1924) 3
7 Lord Colum Crichton-Stuart (Cheshire, Northwich, C, 1929) 4
Hon. G.R. Ward (Worcester, C, 1945) 4
9 E.L. Gandar-Dower (Caithness and Sutherland, C, 1945) 6
L. Ropner (Durham, Sedgefield, C, 1923) 6
Oaten's case, of course, was declared void and a by-election followed
(Americans will recognise these as 'special' elections), at which his
majority rocketed to 21,556 votes. Of course, only sad peeps like me are
interested in trivia like this!! :-)
Yours,
CLIVE NICHOLAS,
Politics Building,
School of Geography, Politics and Sociology,
University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne,
Newcastle-upon-Tyne,
NE1 7RU,
United Kingdom.
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