Winners in RCVS vet and VN elections announced

The RCVS has announced the candidates elected through its latest elections to serve on council and VN council.

Vets Danny Chambers (4,759 votes), Tshidi Gardiner (3,228 votes), Colin Whiting (2,957 votes) and Louise Allum (2,368 votes) have been elected to serve for four years on RCVS council, with RVN Donna Leigh Lewis (404 votes) elected for three years to VN council.

Turnout

A total of 14 candidates had stood for the four places, with 8,542 vets casting votes – 24.5% of those eligible. This compares to turnouts of 26.2% in 2020, 25.5% in 2019 and 22.7% in 2018.

For VN council, Susan Howarth had initially been re-elected when no one else initially came forward, but after an extension 14 candidates stood for the 1 available place left. Turnout was 12.4% versus 17.1% in 2020, 14.5% in 2017 and 10.9% in 2016. No elections were held in 2019 or 2018.

Thanks

All those elected will take their seats at the RCVS annual meeting on 9 July.

Eleanor Ferguson, RCVS registrar and returning officer for both elections, said: “Thank you to all those who stood as candidates and all those who voted in this year’s elections, especially in view of all the extra demands on everyone’s time at the moment. Many congratulations to our five successful candidates with whom we look forward to working over the coming months and years.

“Even though the elections were held during the ongoing pandemic, the RCVS council election still produced the third highest turnout on record, and turnout in both elections was above the average for those held over the past 10 years.

“As always, we made concerted efforts to let people know about this year’s election, which included additional reminder emails sent on behalf of the RCVS by our election provider Civica Election Services, as well as regular email reminders and social media posts from the RCVS. We do, of course, always endeavour to improve turnout, and will continue to review this going forward.”