BY-ELECTIONS are always great fun, and this September presents yet another opportunity to test the political water in Oxford.

And the line-up is already looking like a page out of the history books as three people who are very familiar with elections, and in particular with losing them, go head-to-head.

Tim Bearder, part of the Lib Dem Bearder dynasty (mum Catherine is an MEP and dad Simon has stood before), will once again fight the yellow corner.

The Lib Dems will be desperate to hang onto their 13th seat on the council, but voters may feel betrayed by Alan Armitage, who mis-handled accusations of inappropriate comments to a teenage girl and then resigned.

Labour will be hoping to gain their 30th seat on the council with Louise Upton, who lost to the formidable and popular political force that is Mick Haines in Marston a while ago.

  • Meanwhile, the Greens are fielding...surprise surprise...Sushila Dhall, who has been a city and county councillor, and has pretty much stood in every Oxford election since 1999.

The Tories have fielded John Walsh... we’re not sure either (we think he’s the same John Walsh who lost in Wheatley in recent county elections).

What all four of these have in common is a familiarity with losing elections, so hopefully there won’t be any crying at the count if they fail to buck the trend.

  • Cabinet member for money and talking (business and communications) Nick Carter has had to keep his personal feelings to himself while sweet-talking broadband project partner BT.

The Insider has been informed by a colleague that Mr Carter held back from criticising BT at a recent press conference where the contract between the county council and the telecoms company was signed.

In December, the former newspaper editor had expressed a rather different point of view, when he slammed the markets for not doing a proper job in providing good broadband to the countryside.

He said: “It’s ridiculous that public money is having to put right what the market should have sorted out years ago.”

But then again, if you’re giving £14m of taxpayers’ money to a private company to essentially do its job, you would want to stay on their good side, right?