2010 United Kingdom general election a troubled Labour campaign. Postal voters in the marginal Vale of Glamorgan constituency had to be issued with new ballot papers after mistakenly being told they did not have to sign applications for postal votes. A group of entrepreneurs warned on the dangers of a Labour-Liberal coalition in an open letter to "The Times" on 29 April. Gordon Brown, while in his Prime Ministerial Car on 28 April, privately described a 65-year-old woman and lifelong Labour voter, Gillian Duffy, from Rochdale, Greater Manchester, a Labour-Liberal Democrat marginal seat, as a "bigoted woman". She had asked him about vulnerable people supposedly
1972 Rochdale by-election 1972 Rochdale by-election The Rochdale by-election, 1972, was a parliamentary by-election held on 26 October 1972 for the British House of Commons constituency of Rochdale. The by-election took place during the 1970s Liberal revival, in one of the areas with few Labour held seats and where the Liberal Party was in second place. This was the first Liberal gain during the 1970–1974 Parliament. The seat had become vacant when the constituency's Labour Member of Parliament (MP), John "Jack" McCann (4 December 1910 – 16 July 1972), died. McCann first contested the Rochdale seat for Parliament in 1955 without success. He