The council has published the list of candidates for this year’s elections. I’ve attached a copy of the file here in case the council’s copy disappears off their site in the future.

For me, the interesting things to note are:

• Margaret Edwards standing as an independent in Tarleton after many years service as a Conservative councillor. Something bad must be happening up there – the last time a councillor stood against their party was six years ago after the Labour split.
• Greens standing in Derby, Knowsley, Scarisbrick, Scott and Tanhouse – I think the only addition is Scarisbrick. The first seat that they’ve stood in where Labour doesn’t traditionally put up much of a fight. I guess this means that they’re expanding from their original campaign of spiting Labour in Ormskirk. Not that that campaign has stopped… Maurice George, their leader, left Labour a couple of years ago in a huff to stand against the party.
• English Democrats in Newburgh! This is the election that really shouldn’t have happened because of the small change in the boundaries, but given that an election was called, Jacky Citarella – who is a great, hard working, Newburgh resident is standing for us. However, had we not put anyone up there would still have been an election between the “English Democrats” of all people and the Tories. Steve Garrett lives in Burscough on Liverpool Road, so it will be interesting to see how many in Newburgh turn out to vote for him.
• Less surprising is Ken Walters standing as an English Democrat in Scott Ward. Although, like in Newburgh, it’ll be interesting to see how many votes they take from both Labour and Conservative.
• UKIP standing in Up Holland. I haven’t heard of the chap who is standing – Alan Freeman – and I notice that he comes from Newtown in Wigan, which isn’t even in the District. I can’t see how he is able to stand, unless he works in the district somewhere. Still, I think he’ll split both Labour and Conservative votes, but will split Tories more – making it much easier for Terry Rice.
• Oh, and Lib Dems standing in North Meols and Tarleton. I don’t rate their chances, but I’m guessing it’s the South Ribble party building up their support in the run-up to the general election in 2009. I expect we’ll see more of them up there in the next couple of years.

Despite all these other parties and independents running, I expect that it will still be a Labour / Conservative council after all the votes have been counted on May 4th.