Surge of support as Carmichael retains Northern Isles seat

Liberal Democrat Alistair Carmichael has swept to victory in the General Election, retaining his Northern Isles seat with a vastly increased majority of 4,563.

In the 2015 General Election Mr Carmichael held off the challenge of the SNP by just 817 votes.

This time round he received 11,312 votes, with the SNP’s Miriam Brett taking second place with 6,749.

Speaking shortly after the declaration this morning, Mr Carmichael said: “I’m absolutely delighted. It has always been the biggest privilege that I could imagine to be Member of Parliament for Orkney and Shetland.

“These are the islands where we’ve made our home and raised our children. We feel enormously part of these communities and to be given the privilege of representing them at the heart of our nation’s political discourse is an enormous privilege.

“It’s not one I’ve ever taken for granted and certainly don’t intent to start now.”

Mr Carmichael added: “I felt we were getting a very good response when we were going round, we had a very strong campaign, we had more people out doing more things than we’ve ever had before, and we had a very strong message — I think that’s reflected in the result today.”

In third place was Labour’s Robina Rendall Barton with 2,664 votes, and fourth was Conservative Jamie Halcro Johnston with 2,024.

UKIP candidate Robert Smith received 283 votes, while independent candidate Stuart Hill received 245.

Overall there were 23,320 votes cast in the Orkney and Shetland constituency, a turnout of  68.26 per cent.

Full election round-up in next week’s The Orcadian.