Back at the long delayed Croydon count of votes. Tonight it’s for 12 seats on the Council with the remainder being counted tomorrow from 1pm onwards.

The popular local news blog Inside Croydon has dubbed the Croydon count as ‘the land that time forgot’. Maybe it’s Groundhog Day as the CRO was convinced it was Night 2, until it was pointed out to us by follower CronxCliff that it is in fact Night 3.

So we are back at Trinity School, hopefully conditions in the count will be less scrum like tonight – I am sure quite a lot of Trinity’s First XV would have felt quite at home here on night 1.

Counting started at 6pm and a result is looking imminent in Addiscombe East, a two seat split ward in Croydon Central. Returning Officers has ordered a check of the bundles and there is quite a crowd of (mainly Conservative) workers at the table. Keeping an eye out for a result.

Will be attempting to update as often as we can. There is a lot at stake tonight to see just who will be holding the new mayor, Jason Perry to account over the next four years.

Phew! Addiscombe East was a close finish and after bundle checks Jeet Bains (Conservative) and former Mayor Maddie Henson (Labour) hold on in the split ward in Croydon Central constituency. No change.

Sadly for both their running mates, Tom Bowell (Labour) and Kyle Knight (Conservative) it wasn’t going to be their night.

More news soon.

10.22pm – Councillors Mario Creatura and Ian Parker safely re-elected in Coulsdon Town with first time Councillor Luke Shortland making up the Conservative team in Coulsdon Town.

Interesting story of the night was seeing the Liberal Democrats moving back into contention. Coulsdon has always been good territory for them having returned Liberal Democrat councillors in the past.

More news to come soon.

10.45pm No big surprises in Addiscombe West when long term local councillors Sean Fitzsimons (Labour) and former Mayor Patricia Hay-Justice(Labour) re-elected.

Another long serving councillor Clive Fraser (Labour) elected for the first time in Addiscombe West.

Nearest challengers were the Conservatives but Labour hung on despite a small swing to the Tories.

More news to follow

Three former Mayors re-elected in Broad Green. Stuart Collins (Labour), Manju Shahul-Hameed (Labour) and Sherwan Chowdhury (Labour) survive a 12% swing Labour to Conservative still with good majorities in Broad Green ward in Croydon North constituency.

11.30pm – Bit of an hiatus now, I hear that some more wards are close to declaring, but the story of the night is that there is no story to tell other than the obvious one about the organisational problems. It is a terrible shame that this process has been dragged out to such an extent. Not only is this drawn out count hard on candidates, supporters and the council officers, but it can also have knock on effects for people with other needs like people with young families or caring responsibilities. These people cannot just stay out all night for several nights on the go. Next time the count must be better organised because the confusion of the past few days is very off-putting to potential candidates and party workers, not to mention the people who sign up to actually do the counting.

Another group whose needs have to be taken into consideration is people with mobility problems. The lack of seating and wheelchair accessible space effectively excludes a very large group of people.

The CRO will be taking this up with the Council.

The CRO is now signing off for the night.