Independent candidate Julian German has been elected as Councillor representing the Roseland in the June 4th local elections.

With 1089 votes, he beat Conservative candidate Peter Woodbridge (409 votes), and Liberal Democrat Mark Hatwood (173 votes) into second and third place respectively. Voter turnout was considerably down on the 2005 local elections – particularly for the party candidates.

Mr German now becomes one of 32 independents elected to the new unitary authority, Cornwall Council, which replaces the 6 district councils and the county council. He will sit alongside 50  Conservative councillors, 38 Liberal Democrats, and 3 (three) Mebyon Kernow councillors.

The election results in Cornwall mean that no one group or party is in overall control of the newly elected Cornwall Council, and that the Council does not have one single Labour member.

Although there are no doubts about the overall result on the Roseland, concerns have been raised over the administration of the election.

Not all postal votes were received by voters, and advice on how the situation would be resolved was unclear to potential voters. More worryingly, two children from the Rosleand village of Gerrans (aged 13 and 10) received their white printed polling cards in the post. To the considerable suprise of their parents, who brought the matter up with election officials at Memorial Hall, the children were also actually on the voting register at the polling station.

If you’d like to share your views on the local election, please e-mail our Roseland-Online letters page.