It was a night of mixed fortunes, although we did not manage to win all of our target seats nationally, we increased our overall share of the vote by 4%, here in Maidstone we managed to maintain our 2018 position.

Both our candidates managed to increase our vote share.  Hannah Perkin managed to nearly double the vote share in Faversham and Mid-Kent with a 5.7% increase and 12.2% of the vote.  James Willis also managed to increase our vote share in Maidstone and The Weald to a 16.4% share of the vote.

Hannah Perkin adds a personal message of thanks:

"It remains a privilege to have been able to run in a General Election and to stand up Liberal values and pro-remain voices.

James had the following personal statement to make:

"Thank you so much 8482 of you for putting your faith in me in Maidstone. It's a step forward; we have slightly gained votes since the last election and we live to fight another day.  

I am proud of our principled campaign however nationally results were a bit poor for the Lib Dems losing some great MPs and tragically our leader.

Her words resonate:

'Our country is in the grip of populism - with nationalism resurgent in all its forms. It is easy to despair, but I say let's foster hope, instead.'

I must pay tribute to how Jo lead and represented our party. As a leader, I feel she has given her all and It is very sad that she lost her seat pursuing her dream of a brighter future.  

Yet she made the ultimate political sacrifice to dare to dream building a brighter future. 

Also locally we are pleased to welcome some really good quality new activists, candidates, and members. 

Worryingly, we are left with an all-powerful right-wing government. I urge all Liberals Democrats to join me in positively scrutinising the Tory government in its attempts to leave our friends in the EU.

Thank you to the wonderfully positive team. I hope we can continue to work as a team and encourage our excellent councilors to fight for the infrastructure and services we need to make our County town great."