The 1998 Wandsworth Council election took place on 7 May 1998 to elect members of Wandsworth London Borough Council

London Borough of Wandsworth

The London Borough of Wandsworth is a London borough in southwest London, England, and forms part of Inner London.-History:The borough was formed in 1965 from the former area of the Metropolitan Borough of Battersea and much of the former area of the Metropolitan Borough of Wandsworth, but...

 in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. The whole council was up for election and the Conservative

Conservative Party (UK)

The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...

 party stayed in overall control of the council.

At the same as the election Wandsworth saw 74.3% vote in favour of the 1998 Greater London Authority referendum and 25.7% against, on a 38.7% turnout

Voter turnout

Voter turnout is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election . After increasing for many decades, there has been a trend of decreasing voter turnout in most established democracies since the 1960s...

.

Campaign

In the run up to the election a private Conservative poll

Opinion poll

An opinion poll, sometimes simply referred to as a poll is a survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence...

 was leaked which showed them 17% behind Labour

Labour Party (UK)

The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...

 and likely to only win in 4 wards

Wards of the United Kingdom

A ward in the United Kingdom is an electoral district at sub-national level represented by one or more councillors. It is the primary unit of British administrative and electoral geography .-England:...

 as compared to 18 for Labour. However Labour and the Liberal Democrats

Liberal Democrats

The Liberal Democrats are a social liberal political party in the United Kingdom which supports constitutional and electoral reform, progressive taxation, wealth taxation, human rights laws, cultural liberalism, banking reform and civil liberties .The party was formed in 1988 by a merger of the...

 accused the Conservatives of leaking the poll in order to lower expectations. The Conservatives would have lost control of the council on a 7% swing from the 1994 election, or if the 1997 general election results

United Kingdom general election, 1997

The United Kingdom general election, 1997 was held on 1 May 1997, more than five years after the previous election on 9 April 1992, to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party ended its 18 years in opposition under the leadership of Tony Blair, and won the general...

 in the area were repeated. However Wandsworth had low council tax

Council tax

Council Tax is the system of local taxation used in England, Scotland and Wales to part fund the services provided by local government in each country. It was introduced in 1993 by the Local Government Finance Act 1992, as a successor to the unpopular Community Charge...

 levels, the lowest in the country, and the Conservatives had recently cut the tax by 24%. This meant commentators expected the Conservatives to stay in control of what was described as their showpiece council.

For the election 9 of the 22 wards that made up the council were seen as being marginal.

Election result

The results saw the Conservatives increase their control of the council gaining an extra 5 seats. This meant that with 50 seats the Conservatives had the most seats they had yet had on the council. Labour lost seats in St John and Roehampton wards, which was put down to the closure of the local Queen Mary's Hospital

Queen Mary's Hospital

Queen Mary's Hospital Roehampton is a hospital in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1915 to provide care for wounded soldiers, it became a world renowned limb fitting and amputee rehabilitation centre. Recently rebuilt and modernized it has become a unit of the Wandsworth Primary Care Trust...

. Voter turnout at 40% was 10% down on the previous 1994 election.