Big turnout at Sark's first by-election for seats in democratic Chief Pleas

SARK voters turned out in force yesterday to elect four conseillers in the island's first by-election since it introduced an all elected Chief Pleas in December 2008.

Hazel Fry topped the poll with 246 votes, closely followed by Steve Taylor, with 244. Rosanne Byrne, better known as the artist Rosanne Guille, was third with 219 and Simon Higgins came fourth, with 178 votes.

The unsuccessful candidates were both members of the pre-2008 election Chief Pleas. Former Deputy Paul Burgess polled 126 while John Donnelly, who sat in the old House as a landowning tenant, received 106 votes.

The result was announced by returning officer Seneschal Reg Guille to a sizeable audience in the Chief Pleas assembly room and it came much sooner than he had predicted earlier in the day.

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