Jeremy Hunt's statement to Godalming and Ash constituents
As you will know by now, I was re-elected early on Friday morning on a reduced majority of 891. I want to thank you for placing your trust in me. This was the most arduous campaign I have ever fought. With my team we knocked on 600 doors every day for the entire election campaign. I personally met a couple of thousand people on doorsteps - and if you were one of them thank you for the overwhelmingly friendly reception. ‘Friendly’ does not of course mean you were going to vote for me! But one of the best things about our democracy is the way we keep our disagreements civil. Many of the people who did vote for me made it clear they were not voting for another Conservative government. We lost the trust of the electorate and as I said in my speech when the result was announced we need to show humility and courage as we try to understand why. But putting your trust in me as local MP is an awesome responsibility in its own right and I am deeply humbled you chose to do so. I have some thank you's; firstly to thank Pedro Wrobel and the team at Waverley who did an impeccable job organising the election - both on the day and at the count. In such a tight election that was no mean feat and we were all extremely grateful for their professionalism. Thank you as well to Paul Follows and the other candidates. Whatever our disagreements you kept this a clean fight in which, on the whole, personal attacks were avoided. That is so important if we are to maintain the dwindling trust of voters in politicians.
Thank you to my brilliant team who worked their socks off on my campaign. They delivered huge amounts of leaflets and letters (sorry for clogging up your letterboxes!), helped get our messages out on social media, canvassed and did telling on election day. It is quite a terrifying thing to knock on a stranger’s door for the first time and ask them their political opinion. But it is an important part of our democracy that we listen to voters and my team believe that from the bottom of their hearts.
Most of all thank you again to the people of Godalming and Ash for trusting me to be your voice in Westminster. This is going to be a challenging period for Conservatives but I will try to be a pragmatic and constructive voice of opposition in parliament as well as fighting for the local improvements we need.
https://twitter.com/Jeremy_Hunt/status/1809856593585897485
