The Super Thursday Vote 2021: Local Election results in Bedfordshire

Conservative candidate Festus Akinbusoye has been elected as Bedfordshire's next Police and Crime Commissioner.

He takes over from Kathryn Holloway, also Conservative, who stepped down after five years in the role.

Tweeting after the result was announced, Mr Akinbusoye said: "We did it. Thank you Bedfordshire for your trust and confidence. I am truly humbled. The real work now begins."

The first round of votes proved inconclusive during Friday's count, meaning second choices were taken into account.

Independent candidate Patrick Hamill, Lib Dem Jas Parmar and English Democrat Antonio Vitiello were eliminated at the first count, leaving the race between Festus Akinbusoye and Labour's David Michael.

The five candidates standing for Police & Crime Commissioner in Bedfordshire

PCCs are elected using the Supplementary Vote system, with people making a first and second choice.

If no candidate gets more than 50 per cent of the first choice votes, all except the top two candidates are eliminated.Results of first count:

Festus Akinbusoye (C) 51,700 (42.36%, +5.69%)<

David Michael (Lab) 42,708 (34.99%, -0.34%)<

Jas Parmar (LD) 15,983 (13.09%, +1.51%)<

Patrick Hamill (Ind) 8,279 (6.78%)<

Antonio Vitiello (Eng Dem) 3,387 (2.77%, -3.36%)<

Out of 497,783 eligible voters, only 122,057 cast a ballot - that's 24.52%

Results of the second count:

Festus Akinbusoye (C) 59,793

David Michael (Lab) 50,815

Festus Akinbusoye has been declared as the new Bedfordshire PCC after a second round of votes. Credit: ITV News Anglia

The local elections in Bedfordshire on Thursday 6 May involved the county’s Police & Crime Commissioner along with some council by-elections in Luton.

The results will appear here once the votes have been counted on Friday

Local elections which usually take place every year in May have stacked up because they have been postponed during the pandemic.

Elections in Bedfordshire on Thursday 6 May

  • Bedfordshire Police & Crime Commissioner - currently Conservative Kathryn Holloway

  • Council by-elections in Luton

  • There is no county council in Bedfordshire

Polling stations were open on Thursday with social distancing measures including the wearing of a face covering and voters asked to use their own pen or pencil. Coronavirus safety measures are also affecting the counting of the votes, which usually takes place immediately after polling stations have closed and into the early hours of the following day. This year the counts will take place over several days across the Anglia region and all the results won’t be known until the following Monday.

The results will be included in this online article as they come in

More details of local elections elsewhere in the Anglia region

Bedfordshire | Cambridgeshire | Essex | Hertfordshire | Milton Keynes | Norfolk | Northamptonshire | Suffolk