1928 St Ives by-election

The by-election was caused by the resignation of the sitting Unionist Party Member of Parliament (MP) Anthony Hawke on his appointment to be a High Court judge.

Hawke had first won the seat at the 1922 general election. He lost it to the Liberal candidate Sir Clifford Cory at the 1923 general election when there was also a Labour candidate in the field but won it back from Cory in a straight fight in 1924.

• The Unionists picked Sir Andrew Caird (1870-1956) one of Lord Northcliffe’s newspaper editors and directors [2] to defend the seat.
• The Liberal Party challenger was Hilda Runciman, the wife of leading Liberal MP, Rt Hon. Walter Runciman.
• The Reverend Frederick Jesse Hopkins, intervened for the Labour Party.

The by-election was a three-cornered contest, though given the electoral history of the seat it was always regarded as a two-horse race between Unionist and Liberal.

The circumstances in which Hilda Runciman came to be selected as Liberal candidate were an issue in the by-election. Her husband, Walter, who was Liberal MP for Swansea West, had decided to transfer to St Ives at the next general election. When the by-election was caused by Hawke’s resignation, Hilda was adopted as Liberal candidate to keep the seat warm for her husband.[3]

Liberal party leader David Lloyd George did not approve of Hilda’s candidacy; the Liberal Council, a band of Liberal politicians which Walter led, had voted to oppose Lloyd George's Yellow Book, which set out many of his key positions. Runciman refused to have Lloyd George speak on her behalf during the campaign[3] However, Deputy Leader Sir Herbert Samuel did travel to the constituency to speak on her behalf.[4]

The use of Hilda to keep the seat warm for her husband attracted Tory derision, and became a campaign issue.[3][5]

The result was a victory for Mrs Runciman, who overturned Hawke’s majority of 1,247 to win by a majority of 763 votes.

Runciman was the third woman parliamentary candidate ever to be elected for the Liberal Party, after Margaret Wintringham and Vera Terrington. On election she joined her husband in the House of Commons, the first married couple to sit in the House together.[6] She was the first female Cornish MP and the only Cornish Liberal MP at the time (though the Liberals won all five Cornish seats in the general election the next year).[3]

Runciman duly stood down in her husband’s favour at the 1929 general election and he held the seat for the Liberal Party, again defeating Caird.

Runciman sought re-election at the General Election of 1929 at the Unionist held seat of Tavistock, but finished second. Hopkins also moved to contest Penryn & Falmouth and again finished third.

This was seen as one of the two ‘warming pan’ by-elections in the 1924-1929 Parliament, with Hugh Dalton's wife successfully contested the 1929 Bishop Auckland by-election with her husband contesting it at the 1929 general election.[7]

• Craig, F. W. S. (1969) [1969]. British parliamentary election results 1918-1949 (1st ed.). Glasgow: Parliamentary Research Services. ISBN 0-900178-01-9.
• Leigh Rayment's Peerage Pages

• List of United Kingdom by-elections (1918–1931)
• Politics of Cornwall