David Floyd with a round-up of last month’s general election results in the borough

David Pinto-Duschinsky, the Labour candidate for the Hendon constituency — David Pinto-Duschinsky, who won his seat in Hendon by just 15 votes

The Labour Party celebrated a clean sweep of Barnet constituencies last month as it returned to government after 14 years in opposition.

Three new Labour MPs were elected to represent the borough’s three main seats, while another was reelected in a new seat including one of the borough’s wards.

The closest result was in the Hendon constituency, where Labour’s David Pinto-Duschinsky secured a 15-vote victory over Conservative challenger Ameet Jogia. The winning margin was the smallest in the whole country and the result was finally announced shortly before 9am on July 5th following a full recount.

Pinto-Duschinsky was running in the seat for the second time, following his loss to Matthew Offord in 2019, In his victory speech, the new MP said: “To the people of Hendon I say, I am deeply grateful. Your vote today has delivered a message to the Conservatives.”

He added: “After 14 years of Conservative chaos and failure you have demanded change. The Labour Party has heard you.”

While national polls had suggested that Finchley and Golders Green was the Barnet seat most likely to be held by the Conservatives, local activists for both Labour and the Tories had correctly suspected that Hendon would provide the borough’s closest contest.

Jogia, a Harrow councillor and adviser to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, fought a strong campaign which particularly tapped into local concerns about development including opposition to The Broadwalk Centre redevelopment in Edgware and the Hendon Hub.

The first seat to be declared was Finchley and Golders Green, where new MP Sarah Sackman called the Labour Party “a beacon of hope” as she took the constituency from the Conservatives.

The human rights lawyer defeated Conservative candidate Alex Deane by over 4,000 votes as she overturned the 6,562 majority won by previous Conservative MP Mike Freer in 2019.

In her victory speech, the new MP pledged to help build: “A society where nurses aren’t forced to visit foodbanks; where women and girls aren’t afraid to walk home at night; where we act when we see the planet on fire, and where we welcome rather than demonise those, like my ancestors, who come to this country fleeing persecution.”

Referring to the experiences of her predecessor, Freer, who chose not to fight the election following death threats and an arson attack on his office, she said: “We may have had our differences over policy but we should have had the opportunity to face each other at the ballot box.”

Sackman also referenced her party’s failure to tackle antisemitism under its previous leadership saying: “Against a background of populism and Brexit, the Labour Party lost its way. In particular it let down the Jewish community. The Labour Party needed to change and under Keir Starmer’s leadership it has changed.”

She added: “I’m glad that a changed Labour Party can once again be a beacon of hope to people of all communities that make up this special place.”

In the borough’s other main seat, Dan Tomlinson was elected as Labour’s first ever MP for Chipping Barnet.

The economist for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation defeated Conservative former cabinet minister Theresa Villiers by 2,914 votes in the seat she had held since 2005.

In his victory speech, Tomlinson said: “It is a huge and overwhelming honour to be elected as your first ever Labour MP.”

Villiers, who had fought hard on local issues, opposing local housing developments and organising protests against ULEZ expansion, congratulated Tomlinson on his win and signed off saying: “Barnet’s a special place and I’ve always fought to keep it that way” before ending: “It’s been great. That’s it. Thank you and goodbye.”

The result means that the constituency has a Labour MP for the first time since its creation in 1974.

In the newly-created seat of Hornsey and Friern Barnet, which includes Friern Barnet ward, former Hornsey and Wood Green MP Catherine West won for Labour with a majority of 21,475.

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