Banbury, Chipping Norton & North Oxfordshire Labour Party Labour party for the Banbury constituency, which also includes Chipping Norton, Charlbury and the villages of North Oxfordshire.
Mark Cherry, the Labour Party candidate for the Banbury Ruscote Division of Oxfordshire County Council in the election held on May 6th 2021, with the backing of the Labour Party, is to submit an election petition to the High Court to challenge the declaration of the result of the Banbury Ruscote Division made at the election count on Sunday 9th May.
Mark and his Labour Party advisers consider they have reasonable grounds to believe that an administrative error was made in the declaration of the election result in the Division. The remedy set out in electoral law for this, is for a candidate to file an election petition which requests the result of the election be corrected.
Once a Returning Officer has formally declared the result of an election, that result is legally binding unless it is overturned by a special election court, under the supervision of the High Court.
As it currently stands, Jayne Strangwood has been elected as the Councillor for Banbury Ruscote on Oxfordshire County Council and will remain so until the matter is resolved by the High Court.
We understand that the Conservative Party will co-operate in the legal process until its completion. We ask that sensitive consideration is given to all those affected by this situation but particularly both candidates, Mark Cherry and Jayne Strangwood.
Until this legal process has been concluded, we will not be commenting on this further.