The Liberal Democrats have been wiped out of Cathays for the first time since the establishment of Cardiff Council in 1996, with Labour taking all four seats.
Cardiff Council Opposition Leader Elizabeth Clark managed more votes than in 2012, but was wiped out by a very strong performance by all four Labour candidates, Sarah Merry, Ali Ahmed, Chris Weaver and Norma Mackie.
Ali Ahmed said: “I’m very proud to have been elected in Cathays. I think the reasons people vote for are because we set a positive message of what we want and plan to do for Cardiff. We’ve hit recycling targets, we’re building a state of the art Bus Station in the centre. The streets are much better than they were, there are hardly any potholes in the ward anymore, and they are much cleaner too.”
He also cited environmental issues that “we’ve met the Welsh Government’s recycling targets, and frontline services are doing well and this is all despite cuts in their budget over the last few years.”
In such a student dense constituency, the Liberal Democrats were hoping for a resurgence amongst the before the General Election, where they are targeting to regain a seat they lost in 2015. Labour candidate Jo Stevens tweeted: “So proud this morning of every single @CardiffCentLAB activist, candidate & councillor. What a team. Thank you every voter who supported us.”
Speaking to the BBC, former Cardiff Central AM Baroness Jenny Randerson said: “It’s always been our intention to use these elections to rebuild the party. They were never going to be simple elections.
“Not easy elections, not the results we ideally would have wanted in some areas.”
