Although somewhat overshadowed by some more prominent news on the candidates front yesterday evening, Michael Naughton has been selected as the prospective Conservative candidate for the new seat of Selby. This contains 73 per cent of the previous Selby and Ainsty constituency, and 21 per cent of Elmet and Rothwell. Both were won by the Conservatives in 2019.
Although the coverage of the selection has so far been overshadowed by the omission of Onward’s Sebastian Payne, the final three candidates were Zak Khan, Andrew Lee, and Michael Naughton. Khan is a self-declared practitioner of ‘compassionate capitalism’, and a lawyer from Greater Manchester. Lee is a councillor in North Yorkshire. Naughton stood for the European Parliament in 2014 and 2019, in Wentworth and Deane in 2015, and for Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough.
Despite some speculation that the contest would be an easy one for local figure Lee, a local source told ConservativeHome that the selection meeting was “very unusual”. Not in the sense of anything strange happening, but because each candidate impressed, and it was impossible to say that there was a frontrunner. Whilst Khan had given an “impressive” presentation on Tuesday and “was the favourite” for some, his performance yesterday failed to meet those heights, but was still fluent.
Naughton was therefore chosen from a genuine contest with a good impression made by each. The victor said he was “thrilled” to be chosen and paid tribute to Nigel Adams, the “fantastic” incumbent. Electoral Calculus currently predicts the new seat going to Labour. But Adams is sitting on a majority of 20,000, and we wish Naughton all the best in keeping Selby blue.
As ever, please e-mail me at william@conservativehome.com with any candidates and selection information you have.