General Election: Conservatives hold Arundel and South Downs

Conservative candidate Andrew Griffith, who has been the MP of the constituency since 2019, has been re-elected.

He secured the seat with 22,001 votes, a majority of 12,134, and received 40.2 per cent of the total votes in the constituency.

In a social media post on Friday, Mr Griffith said: “I wish our country’s new Prime Minister and his government well.But Britain also needs a strong and credible opposition. The hard work of rebuilding the Conservative reputation for competence, trust and integrity starts today. If you live locally, consider joining me on this important mission.”

Prior to the Arundel & South Downs results being announced, Mr Griffith had posted: “It is clearly going to be a difficult night. Whilst it was always going to be a challenge, too much of the reason for tonight’s result lies with the misconduct of a small minority of MPs and the ill-discipline of the party in general. What we have not seen is any real positive hunger for socialism. It is quite possible Starmer’s vote share is lower than Corbyn’s.”

The full results were as follows: Andrew Griffith (Conservative), 22,001; Richard Allen (Liberal Democrat), 9,867; Chris Philipsborn (Labour), 9,782; David Thomas (Reform UK), 7,391; Steve McAuliffe (Green), 5,515; Mike Smith (Social Democratic Party), 184.

Speaking to SussexWorld ahead of the election, Mr Griffith said: “I’m standing for re-election as I want to keep on fighting for residents against unsustainable overdevelopment, to help our police tackle rural crime, protect the environment, support our High Streets and to make sure that we have good local public services.

"In the last four and a half years serving as the Member of Parliament for the Arundel & South Downs constituency I have tried to work diligently for all parts of the community and to put the interests of my constituents first. I’ve replied to 30,000 emails, done hundreds of surgeries and newsletters and written hundreds of thousands of words.”