Congrats to Hannah Spencer and the Green Party on winning the Gorton and Denton byelection

Congrats to Hannah Spencer on her and the Green Party's victory. The turnout was 47.6% which according to the Guardian there was a 46.8% turnout in 2024 general election
Spencer received 14,980 votes which is 40.69% of the vote
Reform's Matt Goodwin received 10,578 votes 28.73%
Labour's Angeliki Stogia got 9,364 votes 25.44%
So, Hannah Spencer won rather large. All talk of a possible 10, or 100 vote difference dissipated into the void of a 12% margin over Goodwin and 15% over Stogia
I don't live in the UK, much less Manchester, though our oldest attends university in London. So, I take an interest in UK politics, etc

My personal take a ways from the election
1. Labour should have run Andy Burnham. I think had all the Mandelson and Mc Sweeney sackings and such occurred a week earlier Labour would have done better. I don't like Starmer, I find him disappointing, but he seemed to have begun to regain his footing, talk of people running for PM seems to have had died a bit. I think Labour probably would have been more confident in having Burnham run.

2. I don't think Stogia ran a bad campaign. But, short of Burnham, they were likely going to lose. My understanding is, there was a lot of hostility toward Labour not letting Burnham stand and other issues not related to Stogia. She was going to lose.

3. That Reform had Goodwin run was weird for most people, typical for Reform. The area has large pockets of progressive voters and Muslims, and Reform ran a guy who talked of ending call to prayer and that young women needed to be educated on their "biological clocks' was weird. Then again, maybe, for Reform, that is quite progressive.

4. The Tory party finished 4th. Not a respectable 4th mind you, but just 4th. They garnered 706 votes. Yep, couldn't even make 1000 votes (36,814 people voted). Though they did finish 4th, rather than the 5th spot last time. 706 votes is 1.92% of the vote. So yeah.

5. Oh... and the Conservatives have to return their deposit for finishing under 2%

6. The biggest winner after Spencer... Comedy. And lord is there some goodins
- Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch (God that name is such a close spelling to Badenov... as in Boris Badenov) blasted Labour's performance in Gorton and Denton and claimed that the election showed Conservatives were best to lead Britain.
So yeah. The party that finished 4th with less than 2% of the vote are the real party that should be leading Britain. Yeah. And, as to that 4th place finish, in the last election where they finished 5th, 4th place went to the WPB which did not field a candidate. So 5th place was a real possibility.

-Also (in comedy) Sir Oinks-a-Lot of the Loony Party captured 6th place, 159 votes and 0.43% of the vote. The funny part? He's within 547 votes of the conservatives -- the Party Badenoch claims is poised to lead Britain. They beat the Loony Party by less than 1.5%.
Great night for the conservatives on their long slog back to relevance.
Congrats Oinksy -- Note... many, if not most, Loony Party members are rightwing cranks