Neil Parish claimed that he had come across an adult website while searching the Internet for tractors. He did not explain how, or indeed why he'd been looking at tractors. His allies suggested that he may have been looking at Claas Dominator tractors, a German brand of combine harvesters. Labour Deputy Leader Angela Rayner tweeted: "Neil Parish must think you [i.e. voters] were all born yesterday."
At the subsequent by–election, held on 23 June 2022, the Liberal Democrat candidate won the seat with a majority of over 6,000, taking 52% of the vote. Parish's majority of 24,239 votes from the 2019 general election was the largest that had ever been overturned in a by–election, and the swing was the sixth–largest against the governing party since 1945.
The Tiverton and Honiton constituency was formed in 1997 by the merger of (you guessed it) Tiverton and Honiton. Tiverton had been Tory since 1885, except for a 16–month spell following a by–election in 1923 that was won by the Liberal candidate. Honiton had been Conservative ever since 1885, when it was re–established after a break of 19 years.
© Haydn Thompson 2023