FINAL PLACES

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 61, Issue 186, 21 May 1941, Page 6

FINAL PLACES

ELECTION CANDIDATES, OFFICIAL COUNTS COMPLETED.A SINGLE VOTE DIFFERENCE. Only one rote separated the last candidate to be elected to the Ashburton Borough Council and the first of the defeated candidates in the election held on Saturday. This was revealed after the Returning Officer (Mr R. C. Major) had made his official count of the votes.

It was announced on Saturday evening that Air "SV. H. Amos had 988 votes, and was eleventh on the list, with Mr S. W. Gower next with 980 votes. The counting of 50 declaration votes yesterday added numbers to all candidates' votes and Mr Amos was credited with 1016 and Mr Gower with 1015. The papers were checked several times when it wfjs seen how close the voting was, the Returning Officer wishing to make certain of the position. The final totals in the three issues in the Borough have, been announced-as follows:

. Mayoralty. Dr. ,T. Connor ... ... 1114 Mr J. Shaw ... ... 780

Borough Council. Mr A. H. Todd ... ... 1465 Mr W. S. Kerr 1377 Mr A. H. Fenn 1307 Mr E. C. Bathurst ... 1281 Mr A. A. McDonald ... 1205 Mr W. H. Sarney ... 1192 Mr H. G. Ferrier ... 1183 Mr H. W. H. Smallbone 1169 Mr H. W. Sherratt ... 1091 Mr J. Thompson ... 1053 Mr IV. H. Amos ... 1016 (Elected.) Mr S. W. Gower ... 1015 Mr E. Buchanan ... 987 Mr S. Mitchell 796 Mr C. H. F. Maynard ... 720 Hospital Board. Mr W. Bryant, ... ... 1461 Major J. It. Wells ... 1327 (Elected). Mrs F. Curtis 812

Voters and Informal Votes. There were 16 informal votes in the Mayoralty election, 12 in the Borough Council election and six in the Hospital Board election, a total of only 34 out of 1910 people who wont to the booths. Considering that the system of voting was new, a complete change from that, previously in use, this is held to bd very satisfactory. At the same time it is pointed out that the greatest number of spoiled voting papers was found in the simplest issue, in -which there were only two candidates. Altogether 1910 people voted on the Borough issues, and of these more than half (960) voted at the Borough Council Chambers. This was the cause of the delay in the declaration of the poll on Saturday evening, the officials at those booths having to work much longer than those at the other booths to got out the results. It is thought that the lack of petrol was a big factor in so many people voting at the most central booths. Comparatively few cars were available to take voters to the booths and most of these seemed to arrive at. the central booths. In the past when cars have boon more freely used the voters conveyed in them were taken to the nearest booths and that spread the voting power. 1 The County Elections. The official count of the votes cast in the elections he)d in the County was completed yesterday afternoon, and though some of the totals of votes cast for candidates were altered, there has been no change in the positions. At the preliminary count of votes in the Upper Ashburton Riding election, in which a comfortable win was gained by Mr M. S. Turton, one of the sitting members, Mr ,T. Bland, was only three ahead of the other sitting member, Air J. Lowery, but after the official scrutiny of the papers, Mr Bland is elected with a margin of 10 votes over Mr Lowery. There were no informal votes in this issue.

For the Hospital Board country representation the positions remain as announced on Saturday evening, with slight alterations in the individual votes. There were three informal votes in this issue.